


By the red string

by StayHomo



Category: The Gentlemen (2019)
Genre: Action, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Romance, Unresolved Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-01
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:08:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 30,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24487174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StayHomo/pseuds/StayHomo
Summary: Just think! Coach didn’t find Raymond Smith dangerous for his world anymore, though the world had started to fall apart.The work is based on the assumption that the made up by Fletcher end of story is the absolute truth.
Relationships: Coach/Raymond Smith
Comments: 6
Kudos: 154





	1. Day X

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Красной нитью](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23893669) by [Lisa_Lis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lisa_Lis/pseuds/Lisa_Lis). 



Raymond Smith now looked way worse than five minutes ago, when Coach left him and Fletcher, packed in a box. It was eye-catching. He was obviously frightened, and it made him look younger, less charming and his hair and beard were ruffled. It was the first time Coach saw him like that. Ray was nervously holding the gun. He could hardly use it – for the unwanted guests he was too exposed.

Coach couldn’t think of anything better but show him four fingers. Ray just blinked in response and finally pulled himself together, concentration returned to his gaze. He looked around nervously – Fletcher had already been gone by now. It might be some strange feeling to please or to support him that made Coach offer:

“Should I go after him?”

“Fuck him,” Ray cursed hoarsely “I’ll get him next time. And thank you.”

Coach nodded, gazed at the bodies – their blood and brains were slowly flowing out onto the pavement. He didn’t even know if they were the people of some protagonists who Ray matter-of-factly had told him about for a case, or some new shit. Despite his scratching conscience he preferred to see these two heads shot instead of Ray’s blonde one.

“Rosalind? Is everything alright at the workshop?” Ray was already at the table and was holding the phone in his left hand not letting go of the gun in his right.

Coach belatedly remembered that he needed to find out what his boys had done. And it would be nice if he didn’t have to tell Raymond Smith that they killed his boss. At some point it would be… the word “embarrassing” didn’t show the heart of the matter. It would be totally fucked up.

Primetime wasn’t answering and while listening to line rings Coach could hear Ray dryly giving orders. First to Rosalind – lock herself in the office and wait for whoever Frazier was. Then to Frazier – go to Mrs Rosalind and send someone to his house to clean up. And when Ray freezed all intense, pushing his ear to the phone, Primetime finally picked up:

“Coach! I’m sorry we fucked up but…”

“Shush,” Coach interrupted him as fast as he could. He wanted to speak long, brightly and exceptionally with profanities, but he didn’t have time for it.

“Is everyone alive?”

“We are alright,” Primetime assured, and Coach let himself breathe out a long breath “but everything turned out weirdly with Pearson, we sprayed the car with bullets, killed the people, but Pearson wasn’t there. I mean he managed to get away, the door was opened, and Ghost said he saw the third person in the car…”

Coach didn’t listen to the rest of it. The relief flooding him wasn’t really appropriate – if Micky Pearson was alive, they were all fucked, and for what it was worth Ray wouldn’t be able to get them out of this. If he ever would help them because Coach’s idiots attempted to murder his boss. But if the Toddlers killed Pearson as they had planned, there would have been no options at all. Killing Ray after saving his life wasn’t even an option for Coach, he’d better get himself killed.

“All right,” Coach said, interrupting Primetime. “Get to the gym, but without being followed, and wait for me there. I’ll sort everything out, and then I’ll come and kick the shit out of you. So long.”

He put his phone into the pocket and met Ray’s eyes. It seemed his call was answered, he was listening carefully without asking any questions and his eyebrows were rising higher. His look couldn’t tell anything good. Finally, he said:

“Understood. I’ll be there in twenty.”

Then he put the phone into his jacket pocket not taking his eyes from Coach.

“Have I heard it right from Michael,” he slowly said, blinking nervously “that your boys shot the car he was in?”

Lying and denying would be useless, and he wouldn’t do it anyway. So, Coach just nods and makes a helpless gesture with his hands:

“I’d like to say that it’s wrong but it’s not, alas.”

Ray was now experiencing a nervous tic. To overcome it he had to take off his glasses and close his eyes, rub his eyelids with his fingers. Coach once again felt himself uncomfortable being the witness of his weakness. In Ray’s perfect long game everything totally got out of hand and it wasn’t only the Toddlers’ fault – Fletcher got away, the murder attempt on him was almost successful, and something could tell Coach that it wasn’t the full list of problems.

Suddenly Ray put on his glasses, rapidly approached one of the bodies and kicked him in the ribs with all his heart. Surprised, Coach sniffed like an idiot. Ray glanced at him, put away the second leg ready to kick and chuckled.

“Right,” he said finally putting his gun in the waistband. “Alright, Coach. Now we’ll get in your car, because mine is too noticeable and is clearly known to them, and we’ll get Michael. And on our way, you’ll explain why your actions differ from the actions of your bastards.”

His voice sounded so falsely calm, that it gave Coach the creeps. He hadn’t gotten to see Ray absolutely lose his mind and start killing, but it was the first time Coach believed all that had been said about him. As a rule, it was whispered breathy.

“And you’ll tell me about those guys,” he said fearlessly, knowing there was nothing to lose anymore.

“Deal,” Ray agreed yieldingly, picking up the cases with the compromising material. He made it clear “It’s too long to put it in a strongbox, we’ll take it along”

They were leaving carefully with guns ready, but everything was quiet. Whoever wanted Ray dead didn’t think he would fuck up.

“I’ll drive,” Coach said when Ray made his way to the driver’s door. “C’mon, don’t argue.”

Ray frowned, looked at his outstretched hand - his fingers were trembling. Coach looked away tactfully and dealt with the cases, giving Ray some time to figure things out and shut his pride up. When he was finished, Ray was already sitting in a front passenger seat and typing a message.

Coach got behind the wheel though he knew that as soon he was in the car Ray would begin questioning him.

And he was right.

When they were halfway to the address typed into the navigator a curious detail cleared up – with their stupid interference the Toddlers instead of achieving their original purpose did something opposite. They didn’t have Pearson’s people blood on their hands, only the Russian’s who kidnapped Pearson and held him at gunpoint.

They stopped at a traffic light and Coach had exactly twenty seconds to get over dizziness and get himself together.

“Blimey,” was the only thing he could say.

“Well,” Ray sighed. “Don’t get too excited. What is important is the intention but not how it turns out.”

Ray was right. Even regarding the miraculous rescue from certain death Mickie Pearson would hardly reward the Toddlers with letters of commendation and would hardly give a special thanks to Coach. It was more likely he would promise to shoot him without anything fancy so his death would be fast and it would be it.

“So, what’s up with the Russians?” Coach asked hitting the gas. He wanted to get distracted for a bit and see the full picture even if he wouldn’t need it anymore. “I got it that it was Fletcher who gave them a pointer, but of what kind?”

“Oh, it’s a long story,” Ray drawled. Coach glimpsed at him and was surprised to see Ray smile. Terribly lopsided. “As Fletcher said it was my glory hour, and, you know, he was right. I totally fucked up.”

He didn’t expect to hear such a confession from Raymond Smith. Neither now nor ever in his life.

“I’ll tell you the next time.”

They were nearly there, they needed to turn from the main street in fifty metres and stop near Tesco. The only thing Coach wanted was just moving on without any destination point and talking about nothing with Ray. He wanted to listen to his stories which must have been just as stupid as the story with Phuс and share his own.

“Do you think I’ll have this ‘next time'?” Coach asked. Despite fears his voice didn’t waver.

“Stop here. I see him,” Ray said instead of an answer.

And then Mickey, god damn him, Pearson himself got in his car.

After a short introduction and typing in a new address they drove off. The navigator said it would be a 25-minute ride, and apparently by the end of the ride Coach’s and his boys’ fate would be sealed. But as long as he drove, he had at least these 30 minutes.

Ray started to describe the situation so succinctly and at the same time to Coach’s benefit – he couldn’t have managed to do this himself. Mickey Pearson nodded, asked follow-up questions and cursed a couple of times, quite dull to be honest. Ray could do it in a more creative way – Coach still remembered his bright monologue when they were shifting feet on the bridge like two idiots and were looking at what was left from Phuc.

In the middle of the conversation, which had already moved to the Russians and Fletcher, an indicator on the dashboard started blinking.

“I’m afraid we need to stop by a gas station, might run out in the middle of the road,” Coach warned.

“We are not followed, so I guess we can stop by,” Ray said and waited for an affirmative nod from his boss. “Stop at the nearest one.”

That was what Coach did, when he stopped at BP. To his surprise he left the car alone, Ray stayed in the car with Mickey. Of course, it wasn’t carelessness, they both knew that Coach wouldn’t get away because besides his life there were lots of others he was responsible for. In addition, after he had payed and left for the car, Coach noticed Ray’s stare, it must had been he didn’t look away from him for a second.

Ray’s face was paler than usual, and he looked at him weirdly – thoughtfully and appraisingly. Coach considered it as a bad sign, but he said nothing, he just got into the car and pulled out to the main road. He had fifteen minutes left.

He wanted to ask Mickey straight what would happen to him and the boys, he didn’t want to drag this out. But he kept silent, he knew that his arrogance wouldn’t do him any good. It would be better to put his trust in Ray, he himself said “the next time” and it meant he counted on something.

To his surprise Coach realized that he really trusted Ray and relied on him instead of as usually relying on himself only. And right at this moment of realization he parked in front of the gates of a big-ass mansion. Mickey’s people quickly ran up but were sent off.

“Thanks for a lift,” Mickey started speaking as soon as Coach stopped the engine. “Now let’s discuss your part in all of that has happened today.”

Coach moved the mirror so he could look Micky in the eye. He continued:

“Ray aptly told me everything, so I guess you’ve got nothing more to add”

Coach nodded, understanding that his fine words and promises he had made when he first met Raymond Smith would be out of place.

“Your boys saved my life, and it’s the truth. But what’s important is the intention,” Mickey emphasized the last words. “They were going to get rid of me.”

Coach had already heard it. It seems Ray really knew his boss because he could predict the conclusion he would come to. Coach glanced at Ray – he was sitting straight up like a statue and looking through the windshield without blinking. His hands were wrist-locked, even his knuckles were white. Coach suddenly wanted to tell Ray that he didn’t have to worry about the man he barely knew, even if he saved his life an hour ago.

Even if this weird interest was mutual.

Finally, Mickey continued:

“You fairly completed all the parts of your agreement with Ray, and you really helped us out. You did even more – you saved my best man’s live. Besides, you’re a decent gentleman which also says about your non-participation in the murder attempt.”

Mickey’s words didn’t calm him down - his own destiny bothered him less than his boys’. And the way Mickey called Ray ‘his’, scratched something inside him. Coach nearly started speaking but with a corner of the eye noticed Ray moving – he shook his head as a warning.

“Anyway, sort it out with Ray about who owes who, you owe me nothing. But your boys are a different story. Now they owe me, and when I ask, they will pay back. I understand that at some point it will oblige you, but there’s no other way, you know it.”

“I do,” Coach finally said feeling his heart race. It’s hard to believe but everything worked out.“Thank you for understanding, Mr Pearson.”

“You should thank Ray, Coach,” Mickey said significantly, he had already opened the door “Ray, I’m waiting for you at my office in five. First I need to wash my face.”

“Boss,” Ray said.

They were sitting in silence of the car for a couple of minutes, they didn’t say a word looking straight ahead. Coach’s head started spinning again – he was already too old for this shit.

Finally, Ray moved and unlocked his white fingers. Coach turned to Ray with all his body still understanding only that his trust in Ray proved itself.

“I told you, I’d tell you next time,” Ray smiled nervously. “I think everything went good.”

“Everything went better than I had expected,” Coach corrected him. “I don’t know what exactly in your speech convinced Mickey but thank you. I owe…”

“Shut up,” Ray shrugged it off. “Stop dancing around, I’m fucking exhausted. What are your plans for the day?”

Coach was surprised but described how he’d get to the gym wandering around the city so nobody could follow him, and then he’d beat the shit out of the Toddlers. He felt free to use some colourful expressions, Ray was giggling, vividly reacting at each detail of the upcoming execution.

“Sounds good. And I will go to Mickey’s and try to sort out the shit Fletcher started; however, I did the same. I think I’ll see you at the gym this week, maybe earlier, if we need your boys.”

It was stupid to resent that the Toddlers now were dragged into criminal. They hopped into it themselves and were trying hard to stay there despite the fact that Coach had told them otherwise. They had to learn the lesson.

“I’ll see you around,” Coach simply said.

Ray sniffed, getting out of the car.

“And take your cases!”

***

The boys had been waiting for him in the gym for a few hours when Coach finally got from posh suburbs to this near and dear shithole. He just parked his car and he could already hear the silence that flooded the gym. He came in, and all eyes turned on him. Firstly, Coach said:

“Everyone who has nothing to do with today’s fucking amazing story may go home. Tomorrow as usual, for today everything is cancelled.”

No objection followed. Surely, everyone had already known what happened. Maybe without details and full understanding of the situation, but they knew. In a month Toddlers’ deed will obtain more unbelievable detail, one fucking better than another. Coach’s goal was not to let them be proud of it.

When in the gym there were only the participants left, Coach looked at them. The boys looked at him with guilt, but firmly and were noticeably nervous. Contrary to their habit to talk whether it was needed or not, now they were silent. They looked bad - Ernie sniffed with his bloody nose, while Mel tried to hide his fists; Primetime was standing unnaturally straight (obviously pulled his back), Benny was biting the inside of his cheek, and Jim looked even more lost than the others.

Coach wanted to beat the shit out of them and hug everyone at the same time, because all of them despite their effort were alive.

“So, boys, that’s what we have now,” Coach said quietly crossing his hands over his chest. “From now on Raymond Smith is your second mum, because we are all alive only thanks to him. You will do everything he says, because your debt to Mickey Pearson is bloody big. You decided in such a way to dig yourselves out of this mess which you created because you were stupid enough. Now you will sort your problems out and it will be bloody annoying and long. Understood?”

They started nodding not in sync, and only Primetime had courage to ask:

“So, is Pearson alive?”

“Fuck no, he’ll send messages from the afterlife,” Ernie baited him.

“Piss off…”

Coach shushed; he didn’t want to listen to another round of their row.

“If I find out who sold you the guns, I’ll rip off his hands. And I remind you that it’s illegal, but considering two dead Russians it doesn’t matter,” Coach sighed, then asked “Who’s fucking idea was the murder attempt?”

He knew it was Ernie’s. He generated worst ideas in an abnormal amount, and he also was determined and bold, he was their unspoken leader, others followed him. Moreover, Mel was the one who broke his nose, though with his even temper he never got into any fights without a reason.

“It’s our mutual shit,” Mel said.

Coach chuckled, he didn’t believe a single word, but he was proud because they were standing up for one another. Even after the shit they got themselves into, after the fight in the team, they weren’t going to blame one of them.

“All right, boys, if it’s mutual...”

And he did what he wanted since the moment Primetime promised to sort everything out.

He started shouting.


	2. Iniciation

After three days of complete silence and tense questioning looks from the Toddlers, Coach himself messaged Ray. Nothing extraordinary, he just asked how everything was going and if Ray was all right. He didn’t expect to get an invitation for dinner.

But he wasn’t surprised when he met the security at Ray’s house gate. After the murder attempt only an idiot would sit alone in the castle of glass thinking that nobody sane would come near. Obviously, they hadn’t sorted things out with the Russians.

“Hello, guys, I’m…”

“Boss is waiting for you, Coach,” the big guy said opening the gate for him. “He is inside.”

“Thanks,” Coach nodded.

He was at Raymond’s house only once when he came to show the cinematographic piece of art filmed at the pig farm. Perhaps it was their nicest meeting, despite the nauseous video they had watched. Ray’s stunned face, when he was looking at the screen, was unforgettable. But then Coach was more impressed by Ray’s home look, and now he was curious. Would Ray be dressed to the nines, like in his working hours, or would Coach be lucky to see another cosy look?

Coach got the third option – fucked out, even his face grew lean. He was wearing a shirt with rolled up sleeves and black pair of jeans.

Just like the last time as soon as they shook hands, Coach meekly took off his shoes and followed Ray. As it turned out - to the kitchen.

It smelled amazingly of stake, pepper and rosemary; Coach’s mouth filled with saliva. You could understand that Ray cooked it himself only by the smell. The kitchen was perfectly clean, only herbs and a saucepan on the stove could tell that someone had been cooking.

“How do you have strength for cooking?” Coach couldn’t resist asking.

“It soothes me,” Ray explained. “The bathroom is down the hall and to your left, you can wash your hands.”

It sounded more like an order, and Coach hummed in understanding before he went to look for it. Certainly, he would have guessed to wash his hands, but Ray got there first – it seemed he had a thing for cleanliness. How he dealt with it at work was a mystery.

When he came back, he saw a picture good enough for the best restaurants of London at least of home cooking: the table was set, the roast looked amazing and there was an opened bottle of wine, Coach decided not to read the label. Some things were better left unknown. It all looked like a date really, it nearly made Coach laugh, but Ray messed it up because he looked more like a shadow of himself.

“I don’t even know how I deserved such a welcome,” Coach confessed, sitting down to table. Ray sat across from him, after putting down wine glasses.

“If you need a reason consider this as bribery,” he chuckled.

Coach watched Ray pour ruby-red, dark and thick wine.

“Why would you bribe me?”

“Try it while it’s still hot. Don’t rush or my plan won’t work.”

After all, it was Ray’s home version – he made jokes, gave him interested and vivid looks, and the tension he generated was the remainder from his long day at work. Days. He’d better had a fast meal, or ordered from a restaurant, then had a bath and gone to bed, rather than set up some parody of a date. 

Everything was so tasty Coach could eat the fork. Without shame he shared this wish with Ray, he smiled again.

When their plates were half-empty, and glasses were filled for the second time, Ray finally started speaking:

“How was the execution?”

“The execution will begin when you come to see them,” Coach sniffed. “Firstly, I explained the situation in short…and then I screamed for half an hour. My throat still hurts.”

Ray chuckled in understanding, but his voice was pensive:

“You didn’t want them to be involved in some criminal drama. And where are you now?”

Coach had been thinking about this for so long that he already knew the answer. But the fact that Ray thought about it, that he cared about Coach’s wishes and principles, was a surprising discovery.

“Obviously we’re fucked,” Coach sighed. “When the boys raided the farm it all went tits up. And when we started to make amends, it all became an exciting adventure but not the dirt, blood and shit.”

“Until they see the other side of the coin, they will screw things up,” Ray continued his thought.

“Right. So, I hope they’ll like what they have to do. But it depends. I understand and make no demands.”

“I’ll try to avoid wetwork,” Ray promised the thing Coach was afraid to ask.

It was…generous. Fucking generous, because Ray could do anything to him without regard.

“Thank you,” Coach sincerely thanked him. He continued “But if they eventually get drawn into criminal – there’s nothing I can do; I can’t decide for them. But I’ll be there.”

“They are very lucky,” Ray said not being sarcastic.

Coach didn’t know what to respond to that. He just looked into clear eyes which seemed light grey in the cosy lighting of the kitchen and he thought how it had happened this way. He handed them to the authority of the gangster, and he was sure he did the right thing in these circumstances. And Ray would try not to spoil them because he just promised to do so.

Just think! Coach didn’t find Raymond Smith dangerous for his world anymore, though the world had started to fall apart.

“So, how about bribery?” Coach asked after prolonged silence. The plates were already empty, and he could nearly breathe from overeating.

“Right, bribery,” Ray snapped his fingers. “To be honest, I just wanted you to be in a good mood and agree.”

“Agree to what?”

“To be dragged in our mess completely,” Ray simply said.

They spoke for one more hour: Ray described in detail what he had been doing for these three days. He had already found and caught Fletcher near the Miramax office in London, but he managed to get away. Ray spoke reluctantly and briefly about it, Coach didn’t question him, the main thing was that now California and Universal studios were waiting for Ray. More than by Fletcher’s arrogance, who wanted to sell the script with detailed description of Mickey’s business to American filmmakers, Coach was amused by Ray’s effort to deal with Fletcher personally. He was really going to fly seven thousand miles there and back and spoke about that with such bloodlust that Coach doubted that his further plan would work. Killing Fletcher wasn’t an option, he just wanted to scare him to death and make him search for compromising information on the Russians. He should have had something already.

Mickey could just call the Russians and Aslan senior for the negotiation, but it made no sense. They had nothing to offer, they didn’t want to start an all-out war, and only compromising information could be the game changer. It must be something good enough for Aslan senior to forget about his son’s death and his bosses to think it wasn’t worth it.

At the same time Ray was working on bailing out Mickey’s business: after the first farm was closed the income dropped, after the failed attempt to sell it their buyers got tense. But anyway, the money Matthew Berger had transferred, could help to settle everything down fast, if they used it right. But the fact that Mickey didn’t get his pound of flesh because the sneaky American got away as soon as Bunny got distracted by the call about the murder attempt was disappointing. Matthew seemed to have vanished into thin air and it made everyone nervous.

Somewhere at this point Coach got lost in the names of the protagonists. It was a mystery how Ray digging through this shit couldn’t do the same.

Well, at least everything went smooth with the Chinese, it was a sure thing for Coach – their new head, Silent Joe, was way more careful than Dry Eye and way more insightful than Lord George. He was just strengthening his position, he condemned Dry Eye’s decisions (say affair) as a head and he thought that the reason for his murder was good. And also, he was out to get Matthew who forced all the reshuffle.

So, Ray asked for the permission to drag Coach into their business, because he couldn’t deal with it himself. It wasn’t like this evening he needed any advice or another opinion, no, he just spoke aloud his thoughts to organise them.

And Coach listened to him amazed that it was happening in real life.

***

Coach received messages from Ray more often than he had expected. Meaning he received them in general, but they didn’t have any practical use.

“It’s too sunny in California. Annoying,” Ray messaged nearly at midnight. Coach’s head started aching falsely as soon as he imagined Ray’s state after twelve-hour flight. The sun was the least of his problems.

“If only you could see Fletcher’s face. Unforgettable!” he received early in the morning. Coach fell out of sleep from a short beep of the message signal and could hardly fall asleep again imagining Ray’s satisfied grin.

“I’m already in London,” in a day. Eight hours lost during the flight East now added up. Ray was back.

“Get some sleep,” Coach typed fast, getting distracted from training. On the ring Ernie was fighting Primetime for rights of black skinned population – they were still trying to find a line between racism and insults for effect.

“Can you come tomorrow at four?” came as an answer.

The question was of course rhetorical. Coach started to think how he could change the timetable for tomorrow’s training.

***

In the Ray’s office, where Bunny saw Coach off, an unpleasant surprise was waiting for him. Fletcher reclined at ease on the armchair like he was going to spend an eternity like that. Ray’s fake relaxed pose and relief which flashed on his face as soon as he saw Coach was naturally screaming that he wouldn’t last for this eternity.

“What a surprise,” Fletcher nearly sang, getting up smoothly. “Last time we weren’t introduced properly, right, Coach? Fletcher, the dete…”

“I know,” Coach nodded, interrupting the word flow.

Fletcher’s fake enthusiasm didn’t concern him, but he couldn’t avoid the handshake. Fletcher’s fingers were dry and hot, prehensile. He covered Coach’s hand with his other hand, softly asking:

“Or should I better call you James?”

A bleach-teethed, cocky smile appeared on his wrinkled tanned face. Coach wanted to wipe it out with his fist, but he didn’t show it, just the corner of his mouth twitched dangerously. Fletcher took away his hands hurriedly and made a step back.

“Better call me Coach”

“Excellent!” Fletcher threw up his hands. “Ray, darling, will you let us drink to friendship?”

“One more minute and I’ll let you rest on the bottom of Thames,” Ray said greasily. “Get out and work as agreed. Ticktock, ticktock.”

The tension in the office had risen; Coach once again felt like the third wheel. Ray and Fletcher talked to each other using some manner known to them only. Either old friends ready to slit each other’s throats or sincere enemies. Or even exes.

“Sure, sweetheart,” Fletcher all but murmured finally, all the tension was blown away.

He came back to the armchair and picked up his bag. Lastly Fletcher preciously tapped the paper envelope he left on the table, addressing Ray:

“It will be interesting, I promise.”

The envelope was thick and bumpy – its right angle showed off clearly hinting there was something except for papers. At the very bottom there was an inscription made with a black marker: “COACH”.

“See you, darling, it was a pleasure to finally get to know you,” Fletcher said with a smirk on his face.

Coach could only nod, clenching his teeth, because now his fists were itching even more. Sure, it was wise of Ray to gather information about Coach, in general about anyone who came up to him within three metres. It was the special feature of his job and his careful nature. He had to control everything and what’s more – he had to know about the past of the person who he told about his plans.

It was nothing unpredictable, but Coach felt like he was fully dipped in shit. For the matter Ray could have just asked and then secretly checked everything.

“Sit down,” Ray’s voice brought him back to reality.

He sat down trying to get rid of nasty thoughts. After all, he came to discuss business; Coach was going to dig around and find out what was waiting for his boys in the nearest future. Ray and Mickey settling all conflicts peacefully was in his best interest. He was there not because of Ray, who looked even more rested than before the flight to Cali.

“I see the trip was lucky,” Coach noted.

“Regrettably because of this luck I had to stand this old toad in my house,” Ray sighed.

He suddenly got up from the table and started rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. Coach watched with interest how he unbuttoned the cuffs and with careful and precise moves rolled up the fabric. He couldn’t look away. Ray had light hair on his hands, his wrists were large and beautiful. His fingers were nice too, very subtle.

Yeah, Coach was there clearly not because of Ray.

“We don’t have any dirt for Aslan senior yet,” Ray continued. “Only classics everyone knows about – offshores without any proofs, snatched gas, doubtful acquaintances. And nothing we can give a go. I hope in a couple of days Fletcher will dig something out.”

At first Coach didn’t realize he had to say something and met Ray’s surprised look.

“Are you all right? Is everything ok with the boys?”

“All right,” Coach shrugged it off, trying to get himself together.

Ray’s behaviour was weird – he was showing some hand porn (well maybe the problem was in Coach) and asking about his business like they were friends. It was like he wasn’t the one who digged the information about Coach drawing a line.

“Is there any more news?”

“There is. Matthew showed up – himself. He writes letter to Mickey on pink paper like a heroine of Victorian novels, tries to buy peace.”

“Is pink paper some euphemism?”

“If only,” Ray chuckled. “It’s really pink and smells like bloody roses. It’s good he doesn’t make love confessions; he only swears he wants to make amends.”

Finally, it became clear why Ray had rolled up his sleeves, he started to light the fire in the fireplace. It was really a bit cool in the house, the real autumn had come yesterday. Ray leaned over, moved the screen and threw a balled-up piece of paper on logs. In his mother’s house in Ireland Coach had a fireplace too. It was not a new-fashioned, but an old one and smoking a bit, but it was always a part of his childhood memories. Coach happily listens to Ray lighting a fireplace match, paper burning and woodchips crackling. He wanted to get closer to the fire, but it seemed out of place.

“You are especially silent today,” Ray suddenly said looking through the screen at the fire burning brighter. “What can you say about Matthew?”

“It’s hard to say, I don’t know him. But judging by the stories, he is one hell of a sly bastard. It’s dangerous either forgive or follow him, at least while you have a shit ton of other problems.”

“Right. And that is why we are looking where these letters were sent from and keep everything at pause. The Russians first.”

“It’s reasonable.”

Ray looked back, gave him a short look and came up to the table. Suddenly he picked up the envelope that was making Coach so nervous. He looked at it thoughtfully – it was still sealed.

“Fletcher’s initiative,” he answered the question not asked. “I guess he didn’t like you. However, it was you who put him in the box, I can understand him.”

“It’s interesting how much he has found,” Coach noted.

“I think everything or almost everything,” Ray shrugged.

He went to the fireplace and Coach understood what was going to happen, but he couldn’t believe it.

“James, innit?” Ray asked moving the screen again. This nearly forgotten name coming from him sounded way better, but it was still weird. “I’ll call you Coach.”

The envelope caught fire instantly, there were papers in it, a lot of papers. Coach could imagine its possible content.Copies of reports and his personal file, credit history, maybe documents on house sale or medical record, marriage and divorce certificates, his daughter’s birth certificate… Everything was burning and crackling behind the screen, and he could hardly believe in what was happening.

Raymond Smith should have gone through this info rather than show off his trust.

Ray’s act meant a fuckload for Coach.

“It smells of plastic, don’t you think?” Coach asked staring at him.

“Fuck, a memory stick!” Ray cursed. “I’ll have to get it out.”

Coach couldn’t help but hoot with laughter.


	3. Action

Coach didn’t like the atmosphere that reigned in the gym for some time.

Everyone was obviously tense, and it interfered with the work. Not Coach’s personally, but the boys’ – they couldn’t move accurately and without extra effort, go all out in the ring, think only about the upcoming competition and approach it in the optimal shape. Instead of this all, each of the Toddlers had been waiting for something: some upcoming adventure, some shitty story or some punishment – it was all the same.

Coach understood at once when the time had come: Primetime got tangled up in the jump rope, Benny stopped in the middle of the word, Mel missed a punch, Ernie smiled lopsidedly, and Jim turned white. The others were silent.

Coach looked away from the ring and predictably saw Ray. The usual buttoned up Raymond Smith dressed in a little wet hipster trenchcoat, but with two cups from Workshop.

“Boys, continue training without me. Not with your tongues, but properly, I’ll check when I come back.”

They started nodding not in sync, one of the Toddlers even shyly said hello to ‘mister Smith’ and got a bonk on the head from the other one. Coach chuckled, waved his hand in the direction of his office:

“Come on in, Ray.”

Mel breathed out heavily in the ring.

“Sorry I didn’t warn you,” Ray said firstly. “It was spontaneous.”

“Yeah,” was the only thing Coach said, closing the door behind them.

In his messy personal office Ray looked weirdly but not as an alien. Maybe it was because he was generating confidence, which as usual told the world: ‘this man has a right to be wherever he wants.’ Even in the Coach’s bloody office.

“Is it for me?”

Ray silently held out the coffee cup. His fingers were ice cold, but maybe it was because of the contrast with hot paper and the fact that Coach was hot. One minute ago, he was running around the ring giving orders so now he was heated and thirsty.

Ray took off the wet trench coat, shook it, carefully hung it on the back of the chair, placed in the corner by the window, and then sat on the edge of the old sofa. The way he behaved in another man’s messy office amazed Coach. Ray raised his eyebrows. Coach understood he had been looking at him for some time, he looked away, sat at his table and sipped on the coffee.

Immediately he understood Ray’s secret of sleeping for four hours and dealing effectively with all the tasks on his way: coffee was so strong it could give you a kick better than any pure energy drink. Even though there was milk in it.

“Sugar?” Ray offered, reaching for his pocket.

Coach imagined him taking out sugar sticks like a careful mommy and couldn’t help but smile:

“No, thanks. I’d better use some water to dilute this coffee concentrate. How many of those do you drink a day?”

“Depends on the day,” Ray sniffed. He touched the cap with his lips, threw his head back a bit and made a sip. He drank coffee in such a way, you wanted to watch it. “Today is calm but it sucks.”

“Bad news?”

“More like the problem is there is no news,” Ray thoughtfully rolled the cup in his hand. “Fletcher hasn’t found anything good; the Russians won’t buy the stories about corruption and won’t hush it up. I think we’re missing something.”

Since they reached a deadlock, they just needed to see from other perspective; use their creativity, remarkable talent and approach it inventively like in the situation with Big Dave. Coach couldn’t help but chuckle as he caught the right thought:

“But can we create compromising material ourselves? Last time the film turned out to be quite good, remember?”

“Unfortunately, I remember it as if it was yesterday,” Ray sniffed. “But it’s not the same: Aslan senior is not as careless; all his people are at their guard. It won’t work.”

Coach’s smile faded; Ray was right. Thus, they had nothing but empty apologies to convince Aslan senior to denounce vengeance. And the force which use Mickey would like to avoid.

Was it all?..

“Wait. What happened to Aslan junior? You told me that after his inglorious fall you cleaned all up. By the way, you promised to tell me this story in full.”

Ray ignored the reminder, but answered the question:

“He spent some time in the freezer and two weeks ago my guys got rid of him. The body is at the abandoned warehouse in a container. I guess not in the best form.

“But you can return him.”

“What for?” Ray was staring at him. The cup crunched in his tense fingers.

“Oh, Ray,” Coach sighed. “Neither you nor Mickey have kids, right?”

“Why does it matter?..”

“You just don’t understand,” Coach shook his head. “Whoever Aslan senior is, the only thing he thinks about now is that he hasn’t saved his son. It’s not only about vengeance. He can’t even say goodbye to him; bring his body to the home country, bury him as befits… Russians usually have strong family bond, did you know?”

Ray stared at him so, that Coach got uncomfortable for a moment. It seemed he could read between the lines: ‘You don’t understand, but I do’. He didn’t want to talk about it now, he never wanted, so Coach tried not to lose the trail of thought:

“Anyway, you need to retrieve the body, burn it and give Aslan senior the ashes. Tell him everything. Explain that you were taking away the girl from this hellhole.”

“She died,” Ray said. Coach shivered, not at once understanding they were still talking about the affair. “Laura overdosed after a couple of days. We returned her too late.”

Now Coach wanted to hear this story even more, it turned out everything had gone fuck up in Mickey’s plans because of her. And it was pointless, lord’s daughter died anyway.

“You need to tell about this too. They were all half dead in this den.”

“Yeah. Not a drop of my guilt: Aslan was half dead from heroin, another half from gravity,” Ray crossly waved his hands. He was still angry with himself. “Pathetic excuses.”

He finished his coffee with one gulp, aptly threw the cup into the bin near the table. Coach didn’t want to get in trouble with irritated Ray, he gave him a minute to calm down pretending to answer a message.

After all, Ray jumped to his feet, put on his nearly dry trench coat and said:

“I think it can work out. If Mickey’s good with it, I’ll need your boys tomorrow.”

“To pack a two-week-old corpse?” Coach got it straight.

“They won’t like it,” Ray suddenly gave him a wink.

Oh, it was the best thing for the Toddlers out of all possible. That was for sure.

***

The following evening Bunny came to pick the boys up on a black Fiat. The both facts couldn’t help but make Coach happy: the Toddlers would be supervised and safe even from themselves, and his personal van wouldn’t be spotted yet again.

The boys were preparing for the job pretending to be some heroes of crime comedy. Coach could only roll his eyes at their stupid questions and excitement, but when they tried to take a GoPro with them Coach exploded:

“Primetime, Ernie, Benny, are you fucking crazy? Where are you going to, some joyride or a fucking secured facility?!”

“It’s for us not for youtube…”

“Youtube my arse!” Coach barked. He breathed in deeply, trying to calm down. “Seriously, boys, no cameras this time so you couldn’t post it somewhere. And be careful it’ll be all real, it’s gonna be a big territory fenced by barbed wire and there’ll be security. And the location of the container is rough, it’ll take some time to find it.”

Inside he was trembling. He did everything not to let the boys feel his nervousness, but he couldn’t lie to himself: the forefeeling was not the best. It seemed everything would go tits up again.

“And you won’t like what you’ll find in this container,” he continued. He looked at them – the boys screwed up their faces, nobody wanted to pack a decomposing body. “Bunny, bodybags, handbags, got everything?”

“In the car,” he nodded.

Bunny took all the space on the right from the table - giant as a rock and as immovable. It seemed for all the time of their meeting in this room he just blinked and nodded his head a couple of times, and now he started speaking. Maybe the room gave him no scope. It was big enough but filled with five fit guys, Coach and Bunny and reminded more of a can with sardines. Every minute there was less air to breathe too.

“All right, the last item of the programme and you can head out. Bunny?”

Bunny finally came to life and threw a sports handbag on the table. Coach unzipped it showing the contents:

“C’mon take it. I hope you won’t need it, but Ray insisted on some insurance.”

Ernie whistled in interest, and Coach threw him a gun. The others took the guns themselves. Jim was the last to loom over the bag.

“All right boys go on and do it properly,” Coach said hurriedly. “I’m waiting for your come back, yeah? And you’d better message me from the place what’s up.”

“Sure Coach,” Mel assured him, and they finally left.

Everyone but Jim. Even Bunny guessed to leave after tapping his watch with a finger. Yeah, it was the time they had to leave.

“Jim, son, we can talk about it,” Coach started carefully.

“It’s all right,” he shook his head. He grabbed the gun an put it in the waistband. He hid his clenched fists in his pockets. “I’ll go, yeah?”

Jim obviously had some problems after they shot Mickey’s car. Coach knew Jim was holding the machine gun, so the blood of the Russian mercenaries was on his hands. Must be it was what he believed, but it was too early to speak about it. The best thing Coach could give to his apprentices was time. No pressure, no forcing to speak, he only needed to be ready to hear them out and help.

“You won’t need it, son, everything will go smooth,” Coach said, trying to calm him down. “Join the rest and take care. We will get back to it later, yeah?”

“Yes, Coach,” Jim nodded and headed out from the room.

Coach nervously drummed his fingers on the table, threw the bag to the floor and turned on the vent to let some cold autumn air in. At least it stopped raining in the morning – it would be easier to climb over the fence.

He wanted to take some sedative. Just a bit.

***

The first message from Primetime came in half an hour, they finally arrived.

It all went wrong with the warehouse as Ray admitted. It had been abandoned for ten years but suddenly a week ago it came to life. The owner who must have fallen from the moon had set up perimeter security, fixed holes in the fence and started to protect his belongings. Ray didn’t have a chance to check the owner, all the names he could get were fake and they needed to act quickly. Good thing that they set cameras only on the entrance for show, the rest of the warehouse wasn’t used at full.

Sure, it was a stupid coincidence: judging be the papers, the warehouse was bought back three years ago, and some time ago only Bunny and Dave knew about the corpse of Aslan junior in one of the containers.

“The security is pointless, all four of them hang out at the entrance. We are on the territory, everything is quiet. We are going to block C,” Primetime messaged ten minutes later.

Probably it would take them as much to find the right container among many others. They would have to tap or better open each one until they smell the rotting flesh. This smell would be one hell of a pleasure, but guys would feel way worse when they took out the body. After two weeks it must have swelled up. Overripe tissue, tight and wet, one false move and you’d hear the distinctive sound, and muscles would separate from bone. And the guys had better not throw up in their respirator, because it would be harder without it.

Coach was thinking of it feeling nauseous but couldn’t stop like he was punishing himself. His boys were fuck knows where, sorting rotten human flesh into bags, while he was sitting in the silence of his office. It didn’t matter they had gotten involved themselves – it was his fault too.

At the same time Ray called and the message from Primetime popped up on the screen. Coach only could catch ‘LSS there’s no…’, before he answered the call.

“Do you already know? The warehouse’s empty. No body.”

Not cursing was beyond his control.


	4. On repeat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, leaving kudos and comments!

Ray had done his job properly: by the morning they had the address of the warehouse, where the containers were moved four days earlier. The problem was that the new base was really secured, working and belonged to one sneaky jew – Matthew Berger’s father-in-law.

One more time: there was a fuck ton of old containers in the giant warehouse with cameras and armed security by perimeter; fuck knows which of the blocks they needed and if someone had already opened the containers. And Matthew’s name popped up once again turning the situation into some farce.

“I can’t believe it’s happening,” Coach confessed looking into the pad’s screen.

Primetime had just jumped off the giant wall and cleverly rolled over on the ground – cleverly judging by how quickly he got up; by the black sky that flashed on camera, silhouettes of the buildings and ground, there was no sound, you couldn’t understand a thing.

“What exactly? It seems it’s not the first time your boys climb the walls,” Ray said.

In the car it smelled mind-numbingly of coffee – the one that was pure caffeine, mixed with milk for colour. And a bit of sugar coat because Ray brought doughnuts into their ‘ambush’. They were sitting with the headlamps off, and the only source of light was the pad with on-line broadcast of the Toddlers’ adventures and faint glow of stars looking through rare clouds.

The picture was striking. Coach couldn’t help but turn towards Ray trying to understand if he wasn’t paying attention to the weirdness of the situation, they found themselves in.

Ray was licking the sugar coat from his fingers which were covered with antiseptic five minutes ago, he looked back at Coach.

An inappropriate desire to lick those fingers occurred to Coach and he howled in desperation in his head. He looked into the screen again. Maybe it was the smell of coffee that affected him, after all, Coach excluded caffeine from his daily life.

“Sitting out there with coffee and doughnuts is weird. They’re going to look for a corpse there, remember?”

“I’ll finish by this time,” Ray assured him. “And so should you. Here.”

A doughnut appeared in front of Coach’s face. It was perfectly round, covered with caramel and without thinking long (without thinking at all), Coach bit it. He didn’t bite Ray’s fingers thought he still wanted to.

And it was good that thanks to this damn doughnut (sugary like it consisted of sugar only) he could chew for some time without commenting the situation. For example, the fact that he could hold the pad with one hand and take the coffee cup with the other one, just for the record – and that he did.

The coffee turned out to be a simple americano, but it was really tasty. Such attention from Ray already seemed homelike (who could have thought about it two weeks ago!).

“Give it to me,” Coach sighed after he finished chewing.

Ray obediently gave him the doughnut, and then loomed over the pad:

“Look, the door is open. Block D-4, everything’s right.”

Without Matthew Berger’s assistance they wouldn’t have known where the containers had been. But in the beginning of talks (they had finally changed letters for high technology) Mickey counted on exchanging the pound of flesh in debt for unhampered return of the container in broad daylight without extra difficulties. But it turned out Matthew was at odds with his father-in-law since he had transferred several dozen mils from the family budget to Mickey’s bank account and lost his wife. Nevertheless, he had his people in his father-in-law’s warehouse and it meant he had information and limited assistance. They had to agree, though Mickey wasn’t happy with this fact.

“There are lots of these bloody containers, they will have to keep looking and looking.” Coach pointed out.

The doughnut with moderately bitter coffee went down faster and now Coach was finished.

“Have you seen it?” Ray suddenly asked moving closer.

Coach felt the touch of his shoulder and - the first for today – smell of perfume. Something fresh that even the smell of coffee couldn’t take over.

Coach noticed the guard Ray was pointing at only a second later. Primetime and the others did too – they knocked him out fast and started to tie him up. They taped him shut. It all looked safe and secure, but who knew…

“Now they have ten minutes tops till others understand that their colleague hasn’t come back from the walk-over.”

“Less. Five more minutes for getaway.”

“Nevermind, they’ll make it,” Ray said confidently “It’s only guessing.”

He didn’t want the guys to shoot. Oh, he just wished they didn’t have to, because it would raise such a fuss and Jim… They hadn’t spoken. He still had some issues with guns and the hitch could be costly.

“Fix your face,” he heard suddenly. “Look, they found it. Open it.”

And really, Mel in respirator and with crowbar in hand flashed on the screen and then – the container, absolutely similar to hundreds of others. The Toddlers managed to open it fast and moved back – yeah, they didn’t like the two-week-old corpse tentatively overfreezed.

“Looks like Aslan. The jacket is familiar,” Ray said thoughtfully.

The jacket was ordinary, the colour was indistinct regarding the lighting and quality of the video.What could Ray make out there?

“Did you have any other options?”

“You never know.”

Coach remembered those good times when the Toddler’s biggest crime was just a bit of harm and he himself wasn’t knee-deep in gangster drama. And wasn’t sitting so close to one of them enjoying the warmth.

The guys were taping the bag. They used three bags; it must have been leaking. Then they put the package into a big bag – where did Bunny find it? Anyway, he had a lot of experience in such things.

“Bunny? They moved out, be ready,” Ray said into the phone.

Outside it was quiet. The guys were moving looking around but keeping a fast tempo. Everything seemed to be all right, but Coach wasn’t going to calm down until the boys got to Bunny’s fiat. Or even better – got home.

Finally, the needed part of wall without cameras appeared – thanks to Matthew’s man. Bunny worked like a clock: the hook came off the wall, boys started to carefully fix the bag. And then the rise started.

“If they aren’t ironically caught now, we can call operation the success.”

Coach got a bit dizzy from a bad feeling.

But nothing happened.

When they got to Coach’s house, it was already deep thick night. And still Coach hesitated before leaving the car and going home.

Ray was typing a message as if nothing had happened. He had been doing it during the ride – calling and texting – like it was not two am. Anyway, who would even try to point it out to Raymond Smith? Sure enough, not his people.

Which was why Coach was sitting at the wheel of his car, quickly got used to sensitive driving and a damn comfortable seat. Something could tell him spending the night in it would be more comfortable than in his own bed, but he hardly would have a chance.

“Is everything all right there?”

“Yeah, Bunny has already driven everyone home.”

Coach knew it – each one had texted him from home. Judging by the video they all were pale green and wanted to throw up, but they were safe and sound. Nobody stretched their leg, there were no unexpected problems. Coach finally breathed out and felt endless exhaustion.

“If tomorrow…today in the evening there’s free time, will you stop by?” Ray finally stopped texting and put his phone away into the pocket.

“Free time – mine or yours?” Coach carefully asked.

“Both. If I go astray, I’ll let you know.”

Ray’s invitations kept exciting him. Literally. His heart was now racing, he remembered the first date-like dinner till the main part with those fucking awesome stories about Mickey’s business and other shit.

“All right,” Coach agreed, because he couldn’t refuse. Let it slip: “I thought you’ll ask me over for tea.”

It was too late to bite his tongue. He just frowned and pretended to be an idiot.

“We are standing in front of your house,” Ray pointed out. He suddenly smiled and slowly said: “Do you want to ask me over for tea?”

Playing innuendos with Ray was inaccessible level for him. Coach stepped over the line of a joke too quickly and started to fantasise looking at Ray – content after successful affair, a bit dishevelled from sitting in the car for a long time, but perfect as usual – it all happened naturally. Coach had to think what was happening to him when he had some free time.

“It’s two am, Ray, what fucking tea are we talking about?” Coach just ingloriously bottled it. He carefully unfastened the seatbelt. “As soon as I come home, I’m gonna take some sedative and black out. And so should you.”

“Sounds reasonable. So, see you tonight?”

“See you, Ray.” Coach said getting out of the car.

Ray was going to get behind the wheel. Coach didn’t wait for the second round and left for home shamefully.

***

“Where are going?” Benny casually asked before closure.

Denying was useless: the fact that he had showered and changed into fresh suit was just screaming that Coach wasn’t going home.

“On a visit,” he answered vaguely looking around the gym. Everything seemed clean, nobody phoned in anywhere – it was not surprising, Benny and Liz were on duty. Good it wasn’t Ernie: his curiosity was way more damaging.

Even after yesterday’s adventure the Toddlers didn’t lose their spirit. If in the morning they seemed to have been broken with a feather duster, now after a warmup in the ring they threw away all the moral dilemmas and unpleasant memories. Even Jim seemed to look more alive than usual: new stress heals better than time.

“You look great,” Benny winked at him before disappearing.

Coach sighed, put the coat on his shoulders and walked out into nasty-rainy autumn evening. He nearly forgot to lock up the gym.

He bumped into Ray right in front of his mansion: all jokes aside, the other arrived only a minute earlier and just got out of the car with Dave, when Coach arrived. It occurred to Coach that there wouldn’t be any home cooking today and he sighed in defeat, though he wasn’t even hungry. He had never got addicted to another’s cooking from the first hit.

Dave entered the yard first after waving at Coach with his giant hand. Ray patiently freezed near his car. It wasn’t the first time Coach thought that this black hipster trench coat, that could also cover the uzi-pistol, suited Ray. He ignored the urge to button up two upper buttons. The weather was terrible.

“And you told me you had an evening off,” he complained to Ray, closing the car’s door.

“I got there in time, means it’s off,” he waved it off. “C’mon, Dave will park the car himself. It’s not the weather but fuckery.”

“Autumn,” Coach said philosophically, following him. Only one thought of the warm comfort of the house made him pace up. “Any news?”

“Yeah there’s only news,” Ray sighed, carefully taking off his shoes.

Coach barbarously took off his own stepping on toes and squashing them. The house was quiet and empty not like the last time when there was smell of food from the kitchen or Ray was waiting for him in the office. Now he could especially sharply feel that they were alone in this big ass mansion (security outside didn’t count). Ray held out the coat hanger and once again Coach appreciated his pedantry.

“Long story short, Aslan senior confirmed the meeting. Tomorrow at twelve on neutral territory."

“And you’re not satisfied,” Coach noticed. Answering a surprised look, he said: “Your eye starts to twitch when you’re angry. Like now.”

Ray smiled lopsidedly, went to the kitchen – dark and empty, flicked all the switches he could. It wasn’t bright, just mildly light.

“I ordered food while on my way, Dave must fetch it soon. I think we should move to the living room.”

Coach shrugged. He didn’t care – he didn’t know what he was doing here either in the kitchen or in the living room. It seemed he came here to watch Ray and listen to his low magnetic voice. And it was a total failure, but he couldn’t deny what was happening.

Ray led Coach to the living room turning on all the possible dim lamps on his way and telling him about their business:

“It’s a face-to-face meeting – only Aslan and Mickey. I’ve checked on the place and made a deal – one guy will set up cameras so that I can see all what’s happening inside. I’ll be within two hundred meters looking into the screen like an idiot. I’ll have security scattered on the perimeter; I think Aslan will do the same – but the main thing is we should prevent conflict between them."

“Will Mickey be safe?”

“I don’t know,” Ray answered sharply. “I don’t know a fucking thing, anything can happen – he’ll be by himself there. With a fucking urn of ashes. That’s all we have.”

He literally fell down on the leather couch, leaned back, nervously loosened his tie. Buttons on the vest followed and God knows, not under these circumstances Coach wanted to see him undress (that was what he said – at least in his head).

“You’re being dramatic,” Coach sat on the other side of the couch. “There’s no more danger than usually…lately. I hope you haven’t always dealt with such amount of shit.”

“I wouldn’t have lived to my thirties then,” Ray snorted, taking off the vest. Under, there was a grey tabbinet shirt looking very expensive; it was buttoned up to the last button.

“Glad to hear it’s not the usual style of your and Mickey’s work,” Coach said teasing him, trying to cheer him up. He summed up: “So, there’s no point in worrying too much, you’ve already planned everything paragraph by paragraph. Tomorrow you’ll see.”

Ray nodded more at his thoughts than at Coach’s, he carefully folded the vest and threw it on the coffee table behind the couch. He took a little box the size of a book from there. There was nervousness in his uncommonly sharp moves and permanent want to do something.

“You’re right, I need to relax,” he said opening the box. “Do you want to share it with me? Old school, fifty-fifty.”

It took Coach some time to understand what Ray was offering – then he saw the rolling paper. He didn’t even remember when he last puffed. It seemed it was in his previous life.

“Nope, I’m not a fan,” he refused not being sure. It was tempting - get on the same page with Ray, let loose a bit. But watching from the side was a good option too. “Don’t be shy, I have nothing against.”

“I won’t,” Ray chuckled. “So, let’s finish with business…”

With half an ear Coach was listening to the story about prior talks with Russians which surprisingly turned out to pass quite civilised. Way more attentively he was watching Ray deftly spread weed on the rolling paper then break a cigarette and carefully spread the tobacco. His fingers were moving by their own living their life separately from the head; Coach couldn’t find any other explanation for the way he managed to explain everything in detail and at the same time perform such a delicate task.

Finally, Ray got silent to lick the paper looking right into his eyes. And Coach knew he was staring back. For a moment it seemed time had stopped but finally Ray’s wet tip of the tongue got to the left corner and then rapidly back. Coach breathed out too loud and glanced away. At least in this room as in the whole house there was something to look at – the cabinet packed with books and vinyl records, walls with paintings, cosy pillows here and there, strange sculptures and even small replicas of cars.

But nothing was as interesting to him as Raymond Smith.

“Sorry for always pouring down my problems on you,” Ray suddenly said. Coach looked at him again and now couldn’t look away. Ray was rolling some cheap plastic lighter in his fingers; it was as out of place here as Coach. “But it helps me think. Does it bother you?”

“It doesn’t,” he answered honestly. The talking bothered him way less than the place he was led to by it. “You should understand that I’m head over heels… in your business. Sort of felt the thrill. And I’m glad to help.”

Ray smiled – not with just his lips but with his eyes too. Coach was really head over heels but not only in business. Ray tore off the empty edge of paper with his fingers, stuck the joint in his mouth touching the very tip. Finally, he lit it up and took a deep drag – it seemed to Coach he was the one lit up.

Suddenly the phone beeped – Ray looked at the screen, blew out the smoke and typed something in response.

“Food’s in the kitchen. Hungry?”

The reason to get away from it all and ease the tension was perfect. Coach shook his head no.

“Later then.”

Ray all at once went limp, finally relaxing his shoulders and neck, completely melting into the backrest. He was smoking as gracefully as he was doing anything else.

“Are you going to just watch?” He said suddenly, holding out the joint. “C’mon, come here, don’t be stubborn.”

Coach wasn’t surprised he had unlearned to refuse him and moved closer. He shouldn’t have done it. Ray didn’t give him the joint – he just brought it to Coach’s mouth making him pretend it was nothing special. Coach was just smoking from Raymond Smith’s hands, feeling his hot fingertips with his lips.

He took a drag but, being honest, he could barely breath. His heart was beating somewhere in his throat and Coach closed his eyes not to see Ray’s weirdly amused face. His head at once went empty but not because of weed. He hardly checked himself from tasting the other’s fingers when Ray finally took away the hand from his mouth.

“That’s better,” Ray whispered. “You’re tense too.”

Ray’s voice sounded closer; he was all so close that Coach could feel the warmth he was generating all over him. He opened his eyes and was surprised to find that Ray had climbed on the couch with his legs, and now was sitting half turned very close to him.

“It didn’t get better,” Coach breathed out hoarsely.

“That’s all right,” Ray nodded and again made such a deep drag that the third of the joint turned to ashes.

Ray put it away from his lips, got up a bit and loomed over Coach. It turned out to be too much to think straight – Coach leaned in but didn’t catch his lips. Ray exhaled the smoke right into his open mouth as if he had planned it.

Coach froze up and crazily looked into his bright relaxed face feeling the missed phantom touch and the sweetness of weed on his tongue. Until Ray finally moved away. He threw his hand on the backrest and pressed his cheek there still facing him. He said:

“Remember I promised to tell the full story about Aslan junior?”

Coach nodded shocked.

“So, it was just an accident – the boy just fell out of the window. But what’s remarkable it was me who opened the balcony door, because there was no air to breathe. I didn’t tell Michael about it,” Ray took another drag, exhaled quickly. And continued with a playful smile. “And that the corpse was caught on photo, and I was chasing one little bastard around the block. Until I got the uzi-pistol out…”

***

Coach had barely opened his eyes as he saw a man in front of him who looked like Raymond Smith – light hair, beard, dressed in something dark. He had to intuitively find his glasses on the bedside table to make sure.

Ray was standing in the doorway, already dressed and with his hair combed, his hands were crossed over his chest. Coach was laying in the bed half dressed, the pillow was on the floor. He felt normal except for the foul taste in his mouth. He felt even rested.

“Do you know that staring at people while they sleep is a bit creepy?” Coach’s voice cracked.

He was terribly thirsty, but he wanted to eat even more. But it seemed that yesterday they got to the order from a restaurant.

“I’m sorry. I have to leave in fifteen minutes, and so I decided to clarify,” Ray looked away shyly. “I mean, I don’t take high talks seriously, but if you haven’t changed your mind on going with me – you have fifteen minutes. If you did, then you can shower, have breakfast, do whatever you want, the security knows you’re here.”

There was too much information for the morning in Ray’s guest bedroom. He was obviously nervous and so he spoke too quickly and complicated, but Coach made a decision easily:

“Ten minutes will be enough for me. How about strong tea?”

He didn’t need to think twice to understand that he wouldn’t leave Ray without help.

The other smiled and left to make some tea.


	5. The Talks

When Mickey met Ray, he only gave him an unreadable look and shortly shook Coach’s hand. A thought appeared in his head if it was often that Ray let someone new near his boss’ business, moreover someone who did it voluntarily. Judging by Mickey’s well covered surprise, Ray’s nature and his desire to control and check everything, it appeared that it wasn’t. Feeling special turned out to be enjoyable.

“Our people have already taken their positions. Inside everything’s clear, we’ve gone through yesterday’s camera footages, and now we have this,” Ray lifted up his MacBook Pro with six active panels on the screen: lounge on the ground floor and a part of stairs, lounge on the first, the vip-room, kitchen, storeroom and fire exit. They could see the situation near the main entry themselves.

“I knew you’d come up with something, Ray,” Mickey said satisfied. “I guess we’ll be in the vip-room. Do you have sound?”

“I don’t. We used their cctv, redirected the video feed, but didn’t have time to set our micros. We’d better not put some on you, the Russians won’t like it. I can’t read lips, I’m not Fletcher.” Ray grimaced like he had toothache. Suddenly he turned to Coach: “Can you?”

In response Coach only rolled his eyes. Mickey made a laugh:

“Ray, you want too much. We don’t need sound. Unless he tries to break the urn on my head – everything’s fine. You remember the arranged signals. Didn’t you forget the present?”

From the backseat Coach handed over the black thick paper bag with the urn. Forgetting it would be quite stupid. Judging by the irritated sigh, Ray thought the same.

Three black beamers rolled into the parking lot in front of a new-fashioned building, which was occupied by the ‘Fishers’ restaurant. Almost at once big guys rolled out of the cars, the last one was Aslan senior, who stood out with expensive suit, bright gaudy tie and bored-impatient face. He looked right at Ray’s car, nodded in the direction of the restaurant and headed to the entry all alone. The Russians started to settle down on the territory.

“We must have shot them the fuck down, and we are playing diplomacy here.”

And there was so much sorrow in Mickey’s voice that Coach snickered.

“We’ll play a bit more, if it doesn’t work out – we’ll shoot them down, boss,” Ray said softly, like he was comforting a moody kid. “All right, don’t make Aslan wait.”

Coach wanted to clarify which one, but the vibe wasn’t right. Mickey was obviously tense though he behaved like a tough mafioso should, and Ray… He was just himself: collected, silent and probably screaming under his outer armour.

“All right. Don’t get bored,” Mickey said, took the bag and got out of the car.

He was wearing a three-piece suit in blue checks, soft and perfectly tailored, a stylish kepi and very expensive shoes. Mickey looked like a man who you could’t shoot at any circumstances – only avoid him at any cost or take him as a hostage at the very least. Though it wasn’t working that way. He still was in danger despite all Ray’s preparations.

“I hope it will be boring.” He mumbled.

Coach moved to the front seat to also see the things happening on the screen.

And really, they were to be bored for a long time.

Aslan senior was a living stereotype of a Russian man – stern face, limited emotional spectre, if it could reach one of the ends - it was anger. However, it wasn’t a pleasant meeting for both of them, though Mickey smiled politely from time to time. The bag with urn now was in the Russian’s hands – it was the only moment when even regarding the awful quality of video you could see the change in his face. They didn’t talk about immediate handover of the ashes, only about the preliminary meeting and talks, but Mickey decided to add this nice touch, show his generosity. After all, there was no fucking reason they needed Aslan junior’s ashes, no matter how the meeting ended. If the Russian didn’t appreciate Mickey’s apologies, there would be only act of force left.

“Seems he took the bait,” Coach noticed. “Mickey had the right idea.”

“Michael knows how to manipulate,” Ray said in a manner that most suited a proud mother or some celebrity’s young fangirl.

Coach winced but didn’t comment on that. Ray had been working for Mickey for eleven years, and obviously would never expose himself for the boss de didn’t respect. Actually, the respect sometimes looked like frank admiration, but that was just the person Mickey Pearson was.

On the wide table in front of Mickey and Aslan there were teacups, none of them pretended he was going to drink it. On the neutral territory there was no sense to follow hospitality rules, and Aslan senior didn’t seem to like playing along. He was straightforward, strict, and as Ray confessed - quite appealing. Especially in comparison with sly snake Matthew. If he hadn’t sent mercenaries to them twice, he would have been a nice bloke.

“They shake hands, means everything’s as planned. Aye, and Michael scratched his ear, as we agreed,” Ray pointed out, he loomed over the screen predator-like. His nostrils madly flared, like he was an animal before the final jump on his prey. “They exit the vip lounge. Was there anyone on the stairs?”

There was a blind zone on the ground floor staircase. It was taken into the account, and they payed close attention to it so few visitors disappeared there and then again appeared on the cameras.

“It’s clear.”

“Aye, here, gone down. Head to the exit, the lounge’s empty.”

There was nothing more to look at, and Coach leaned into the backrest. Looked around the street – if he never knew how much security from both sides there were, he would never guess what was happening there. He could guess only by the parking lot packed with expensive cars. It was good there were no high buildings – all the comfortable positions had been counted by fingers and there were their people.

Coach had a sinking feeling somewhere behind diaphragm. Coach nearly pressed himself into the windshield trying to find Frazier’s people but found nothing.

“Ray, when was the last time Frazier reported?”

Every five minutes all the groups reported to Ray that everything was clear. Judging by Ray’s tense silence, not everyone reported the last time. 

Aslan senior was the first to grab the doorknob, Mickey was a little behind. Ray snapped, looked around the street confused, the whole part under oversight.

And then Coach saw the reason why his intuition revolted. From behind the newsstand, where Frazier’s position was, a man showed up, obviously not looking like either the Russian security or their own. He was holding a gun in his hand. Ray followed Coach’s gaze and hurriedly grabbed his gun, released the safety, while Coach pushed the button into dashboard, rolling down the window on Ray’s side.

It took them three seconds and not a single word.

Ray shot simultaneously with the killer and got him. However, they both got it: Aslan senior fell down on his back, holding onto his wounded shoulder.

“You fucking cunt, the fuck?!” Ray shouted, rolling out of the car. The MacBook fell down under the seat like useless garbage.

Coach followed Ray, taking out the gun from his pocket. Adrenaline pumped blood even faster now and like in slow-motion he could see Ray scream at Mickey to get back into the building, and then dash to Aslan. Ray was too exposed, right at their fingertips, and for the first time Coach was really scared for him. Bulletproof vests they had on couldn’t save from everything. The killer was definitely dead, Ray got him right in the forehead, but who knew if he was alone and what Russians would do.

The bullet hit Aslan just beneath the neck, nearly in his shoulder, luckily it hadn’t nicked the carotid artery – the blood wasn’tspurting out. And still it was on the ground more than a fucking lot, and the fingers of the Russian couldn’t handle the flow. He already started to black out. In the back of his mind Coach pointed out that the broken urn on the ground looked silly – almost all the ashes stayed in it and in the bag, barely making it to pavement. A misplaced thought flashed in his mind – they’d have to collect it carefully.

“It’s venous, we need to bind it tightly,” Coach said, replacing Aslan’s hand with his own.

The blood was hot and smelled of iron. Coach diligently ignored flashbacks from his previous life, trying to apply more pressure on the wound. The bullet stayed inside. If he develops pulmonary embolism, he’s dead meat.

“Will the tie do?”

Ray took off his own though he could untie the one Aslan had. Coach didn’t have enough hands for that, and Ray couldn’t figure it out or was just squeamish, so he just sacrificed this piece of his wardrobe. Without saying anything to him Coach started to tighten the tie around Aslan’s neck having no sympathy for expensive fabric – the life was way more important. Especially their own lives, because Russians could shoot them down right there, never minding the police and any attempts to figure out what had happened. But there was a chance for salvation.

They heard the click of the safety catch – one, two, three. They were surrounded. Coach glanced at Ray; he knew he would do the talking. He continued to steadily tighten the tie.

“All right fellas, no nonsense,” Ray said strictly, slowly getting up. He pointedly left the gun on the ground. “Did you call the ambulance?”

“Yes, they are already…” one of them answered.

“Shut it,” another one barked, addressing his partner. “What the fuck you’ve done?”

“Dare I say, at this exact moment of time we are trying to save your boss’ life,” Ray said softly. “And the killer messed up, because I shot him first. You know that professionals aim for the head.”

“I don’t care, motherfucker, maybe it was you who killed him so he could not tell a fucking thing,” reasonably pointed out the one who spoke first.

“Maybe,” Ray responded icily.

Coach got distracted from looking on his bloody fingers on Aslan’s blue skin, he looked at Ray. In his life he had never been so close to laying everyone in the fucking ground. It could be a spectacular suicide, even the help from Mickey’s people, who came up, wouldn’t save the situation. But he didn’t have to step in – Ray wasn’t suicidal and so after one long moment he put himself together.

“But the killer isn’t ours. Oi fellas, seriously, the main thing now is to wait for the ambulance, then post guards at the hospital, even in reanimation, so that no cunt would… That’s if your boss makes it,” nobody dared to interrupt Ray’s quiet, intense voice. Maybe in his previous life he was a snake charmer, because in this one even the most aggressive bastards listened to him. “But if this happens, he’ll confirm that they have agreed with Michael. Here’s the urn with ashes, don’t forget it, by the way. We’ll take the cctv footage, make sure that conflict has been exhausted. And then I’ll personally find the one responsible for this fuck up and give him to your bosses, okay?”

Finally, they heard the ambulance siren. No one ever objected to Ray – everyone hid their guns not to bother civilians.

Coach exhaled a breath of relief.

***

This time Coach had the honour to visit Mickey Pearson’s home office and now was drinking expensive whiskey. He didn’t get any joy from this, but he couldn’t refuse. Aslan senior still was in the reanimation, though his chance for survival was high. Ray had everything under control: his anaesthesiologist in pocket was feeding him information, Mickey and him had already talked to the head of the Russian mafia (no side wanted to have another meeting and see what would happen) and had negotiated another week to find the one responsible. They were still under suspicion, but the cctv footage came in handy. The killer’s identity was still unknown – Ray was waiting for the report from the police and at the same time used Fletcher not to waste time.

Coach could swear that Mickey and Ray had done it all within an hour. Coach got a bit nauseous from the scale of their work, the way the local police tiptoed around Mickey Pearson (they weren’t even questioned, one of the cops just shook Ray’s hand, nodded in understanding and promised to keep them informed). From time to time he would forget what power he got along with, and the reminder always turned out to be not a pretty one.

However, they were still alive. Not a bad result, regarding the killer that came out of nowhere.

“All right,” Mickey breathed out, theatrically raising his glass. “We’ve already appreciated Coach’s superior medical talent, now I’ll tell you Ray: you were stunningly convincing.”

“I thought they’ll shoot us the fuck down,” Ray rolled his eyes. “Whoever did it, the plan was perfect: a face-to-face meeting, nobody knew the result, and suddenly Aslan gets killed. Stereotypical Russians must have gone on a killing spree.”

“The orderer had it all figured out perfectly,” Coach pointed out.

“Why didn’t you think it was me?” Mickey suddenly smiled.

Coach nearly spilled whiskey on himself in reaction.

“Maybe we hadn’t come to an agreement with Aslan,” he continued confidently. “And I gave the killer a sign and didn’t warn you, so you looked sincere. Ray, when your eyes are honest even the Russian mafia buys it, I know.”

Coach couldn’t understand anything from Mickey’s face, so he stared at Ray. He was burrowing Mickey with his eyes for twenty seconds, suddenly went limp, leaned back in the armchair and chuckled:

“It’s a bluff, Michael. And by the way, it would have been a fuck up of a plan, because we’ve miraculously survived and now, we’ve been put on the clock. Who would you turn in instead of yourself?”

“Fletcher,” Mickey laughed, saluting with the glass. “But you’re right, I’m bluffing. We are actually fucked again.”

Coach’s head started aching unbearably. He wanted to go home, pull off his suit, covered in blood, get into cold shower and forget everything related to Mickey Pearson’s business, who managed to make such shitty jokes. Or maybe he would just leave a picture of Ray and wank. Then he would go to the gym, because he had been neglecting it for some time now.

“You two are so fucked up,” Coach confessed sadly and wholeheartedly.

Ray and Mickey snorted at once. Jerks. 


	6. The Sequence

Working day morning in the gym always was the quietest time. The majority of the boys and girls were studying or working, so the real life was beginning mid-afternoon. But Coach faithfully opened the gym at ten, trying to pay attention to personal trainings of those who were free. Moreover, it was important that everyone knew that the place where you could spend some quality time was always opened (but officially after ten in the morning).

Coach lovingly went around his property – the place he called home. The flat he was renting nearby was just a temporary shelter and was good only for sleep, shower and breakfast. But here he always felt like himself.

Everything was at its place: weights and dumbbells sorted by weight, mats piled in the corner of the ring; in the common room there were no sandwich wrappings left, no dirty cups or towels laying around. Sure thing! After all, yesterday he managed to get to the gym, a bit drunk and very tired, and supervised the cleaning personally. Ernie was good at dealing with administrating and trainings on his own, but at the end of the day usually let those who were on duty to cut corners.

What he didn’t expect was that the first visitor for today would be Ray.

“Morning” he said without real joy, showing the holder with two cups. “Got time?”

“I start to get used to it,” Coach pointed out, approaching him to take a cup without ‘Raymond’ written on it.

“To me?” Ray smiled disarmingly.

His heart sank but Coach found the strength to casually take the cup from the holder and answer:

“To free coffee. I’ve drank more of it in the last two weeks than in three years before.”

“I know, so I got you some fruit tea.”

Coach was lost for words, so he just thankfully plopped into the cup and stepped away to the ring. Sometimes it seemed to Coach that Ray was hitting on him like on some girl: dinner with wine, coffee and doughnuts, one joint for the two of them. At remembering this evening and their near-kiss his brain shorted out, and he was saved only by the trail of thoughts: the body in the container, bullet wound to the neck, Russian guns pointed at them. Coach’s dossier burned in the home fireplace stood alone but wasn’t of least importance.

“I want to show you something, maybe you’ll give me an idea,” Ray started looking for something in his phone.

“How is Aslan?” Coach leaned against the ring.

“Still in coma. But if he is guarded properly, he won’t die. The doctors pulled him through, and your first aid too.”

Primetime and Jim were about to come but Coach didn’t want to go to his office. They’d find him anyway, and it was hard not to notice Ray’s car in front of the gym. And for that matter, he had nothing to hide from them. Not the regular cups from Workshop, right?

Maybe just Raymond Smith who closely approached him when he finally found what he had been searching for and put his phone in front of Coach’s face:

“We got the killer’s phone, it’s the photo he took two hours before the assault.”

On the screen there were letters and numbers written with a steady hand, five in a row, hyphen and two more. They didn’t remind him of anything at all, but the background – rose pink, matte, made him draw himself together:

“Pink paper?”

“Aye. Makes you think of Matthew Berger, right? Handwriting is similar.”

“Yeah, but it’s too early to judge only by the single photo,” Coach pointed out. “Though…”

That was hardly a coincidence. There was already too much of them in this story, and one more threatened to break his head finally. No, it must have been Matthew: he waited till he was forgotten, found out, again thanks to them, about the body in the container, put two and two together and decided to crack Mickey down with Russian hands. Mickey, Ray, and everyone who was related to the business and knew about his humiliation. But he didn’t take into the account that his mercenary was quite stupid.

Sure, Coach had no idea what Matthew was guided by, but this plan didn’t yield in smartness to the previous one. Wasn’t there too much in common?

“It’s him,” Ray sighed. “Next time we would take on him at once, but Russians need hard evidence. So, we have only those clues. Is it a password? Some code?”

Ray tiredly leaned on Coach’s shoulder with his own and he was missing two inches to touch cheek to cheek. Coach’s thinking process stopped until he heard from the doorway:

“Blimey, long time no see! Oh, I mean, good morning mister Smith, Coach…”

Primetime’s face gone wild: he was trying to keep from smiling and make a proper innocent face, but it sucked. Maybe he had become a witness of something he didn’t have to see, but God knows, that wasn’t Coach’s fault.

“A very good,” Ray said softly, leaning away a bit (but it still wasn’t enough). “I think I need your head.”

Primetime got obviously tense; his grin faded like it was never there. Coach couldn’t help but giggle. Ray snickered, shook his head:

“I mean bright ideas. Look, does this character set remind you of something?”

Ray turned the phone to Primetime, stretched out his hand. And when recognition flashed on his face, Coach rejoiced.

“Looks like coordinates,” Primetime stated. “Like, location on online map. Let’s use the computer and google it?”

“Great job, son,” Coach couldn’t help but praise him.

Ray put his phone into the pocket, came up to Primetime and patted him positively on the shoulder. Primetime felt sick again.

The set of letters and numbers really turned out to be a map location – at least it was in London, which could hardly be a coincidence. The shopping mall was in the south, as Ray pointed out irritated – on the territory beyond Mickey’s control.

“And what can be in this shopping mall? Mass-market clothes? Toy store?” Coach grumbled.

“Maybe terminals?” Primetime again pleased them with his savvy. “Something like storage unit, got it, yeah?”

Coach rolled his eyes:

“We are not that old. And so, this terminal? Does it need a special password?”

“Yeah. A secret password, that only the receiver knows – and the system too. Maybe he had something else on his phone, messages?”

“No,” Ray shook his head. He was still looking into the screen with the map on it like it could give him one more hint. “There’s no authorised apps, mail, anything. But if we at least find out his name, address, and if we find his personal belongings, maybe we’ll dig something out… the storage cell number, the password…”

They didn’t know what they wanted to find. The request was utmost abstract: anything that would let them make sure Matthew was involved and would help them to prove it to Russians. Anyway, there were no other clues.

“I’ll send the guys in; let they look at that mall. There’s no sense in constant surveillance until we at least find out the number of the cell.”

“Have the police identified him?” Coach got back to the previous topic.

“I’d rather bet on Fletcher,” Ray chuckled. At the exact same moment his phone started ringing and he looked at the screen in surprise.

“Fletcher?” Coach guessed by his face.

Instead of an answer Ray stood up straight no longer looming over Primetime and answered the call. Surprisingly Fletcher spoke briefly: Ray told him to shut up and get to the point only once. At the end of the talk he unwillingly said ‘thanks’ and immediately ‘fuck off’, nothing special here.

“We’ve got the hotel address where the killer stopped. His stuff is still there, and the room is paid till three pm. Will the boys?..”

Primetime’s eyes lit up: he was the one of those who weren’t anyhow affected either by attacks on gangsters or by rotting bodies. Coach sighed and started calling around for others.

***

Van’s back wheel turned out to be flat: should have changed the old ones, but Coach was forgetting about it this whole month. There was no time either to inflate the wheel or wait for Bunny on his Fiat.

So here they were in Ray’s car: Ray at the wheel, Coach, and four boys in the back. The gym was again on Ernie, who was not satisfied with such a situation; and Coach couldn’t convince the others to cut in half. They resisted and all four of them got into the backseat, pretending that riding without breathing was very comfortable.

Ray’s eye nervously twitched while he was watching them crowd into his overly expensive car. The trip promised to be fascinating.

Somewhere on the fifth traffic light the boys couldn’t take no more of closeness and tense silence and started chatting. By the eighth they were loudly arguing about the location for the next music video and which naming they would use – ‘BlackBox’ or ‘BIG Black Box’. Out of pure curiosity Coach was silent and waiting when Ray would lose his nerve. And he also hoped that he wouldn’t understand by the context which black box they were talking about.

It happened when Benny and Mel got so excited about the argument about who of them was sitting not compactly enough, that they started to poke each other with elbows. Ray coughed, and there was instant silence in the car.

“Either you keep silent or Primetime sits in someone’s lap, so all of you have enough space. Is it clear, kids?”

Coach looked back to see the Toddlers nod. Ray’s voice, soft and falsely calm, was frightening even him (though hints of strictness more likely turned him on).

“Why me?” Primetime’s acutely attuned sense of justice won over his survival instinct.

Ray clutched the steering wheel and confessed even more quietly:

“You’re the only one I remember. Yet.”

Coach couldn’t help but laugh into his fist. There was nothing funny for the boys.

***

By the façade you could say it was quite a flophouse. Gaudy signboard and floor-to-ceiling windows didn’t blend with old weather beaten red-brick building. You didn’t have to google it to give the hotel two stars, though Primetime had warned them.

A young blonde met them at the reception. Against all expectations she seemed not to tense up as she saw three men without luggage or road bags in the doorway. At least one of them was out of this place’s league. She just gave Coach, Ray and Jim an indifferent look and clarified:

“Which room?”

She didn’t offer to rent it, she was straightforwardly asking which one they needed to get into. Apparently, it was her great lifetime experience speaking. Ray’s face lighted up, he was enjoying the opportunity to skip dancing around: maximum of effectiveness at minimum time wasted.

“Eight,” two fifty quid banknotes landed on the desk. “We’ll renew for, say, one more hour. Keep the change.”

It was the first time the girl perked up since they entered the small miserable hall. She nodded in understanding and quickly grabbed the money.

“Welcome, gentlemen,” she handed out the key. “First floor, to the end of the hallway.”

Coach was following Ray on the stairs and couldn’t get over the feeling it was all too easy. The girl turned out to be cooperative, though it was usual for such a job – you stop being curious over time. After all, it was just a seedy hotel in a rough area, so the safety of the clients wasn’t a part of corporate ethics. But assistance to cultured gangsters with a polite smile and gun in the waistband maybe was. And moreover – easy money.

They quickly walked down the hallway, painted dirty-beige five years ago. On this floor there were four more rooms in addition to the one they needed, there was no sound from behind blue chipped doors. Ray carefully put the key in the lock, turned it with a quiet creak and pushed the door open.

Mel and Benny were waiting in the car, Primetime was watching the backdoor. Everything was under control, but Coach still was a bit anxious – however it was a common practice when he got in foul-up with Ray.

The room was blank. The only thing that stood off from the sparse décor of the empty-like room was the unmade bed with worn out mattress where Coach wouldn’t wish to sleep on his enemies, and there was a stack of magazines on the table by the window. At first glance, there was no stuff the killer left here – he obviously didn’t plan on going back.

“Seem sempty, but let’s take a closer look,” Coach tried to cheer Jim, noticing his disappointment.

Ray only sighed. They closed the door and spread out: Ray started to examine the wardrobe, Jim stayed near the door, pointedly releasing the safety on the gun he had got in the car. Coach didn’t like the way he nervously gripped it. But Jim didn’t want to talk, pretending he had no problem.

In the small, say microscopic, bathroom it smelled of old soap and stagnant humidity. The yellow shower cabin, judging by a rusty patch and water spots, was used the day of assault. Coach winced squeamishly when on the sink he saw a razorblade with black hairs stuck in it. Ray had better not see it.

From the sounds from the room, Ray was checking the pillows. It was reasonable, but the sense told that they would find nothing here. And yet Coach attentively looked around: the mirror, except for a couple drops of toothpaste, was clear, the toilet too. He started to open the water tank when suddenly he heard the noise and a man’s voice:

“Chill, kid, you should first learn how to hold a gun. Let me show you!”

“Jim don’t even think to put down the gun,” he heard Ray’s strict voice.

It wasn’t hard to understand what was going on: Jim was at gunpoint of some guy, Jim was returning the favour, Ray must haven’t had the smallest opportunity to pull out the gun, Coach slowly without a sound lowered the tank lid back and leaned against the crack in the door. Just to make sure they were fucked: Ray was standing on his knees near the bed, in a clearly disadvantageous position – must have searched the space under the bed.

The attacker and Jim were out of sight, but he could hear them very well:

“Give it up, kid, your hands are shaking, I know you won’t shoot.”

Actually, Jim could, but that was the problem – two Russians down. The attacker didn’t know about it, but he could read body language, and the tone of his voice seemed familiar to Coach. Just a bit – maybe it was that all the guys from low places possessed this manner of speaking lazily and cheekishly, when they thought they were on top of the situation.

There was a metal hit on the floor and Ray’s sigh: Jim dropped the gun. He should have taken any other one from the trinity that was outside.

‘No,’ Coach thought irritated. ‘I should have talked to him, not beat around the fucking bush trying to deal with my own problems. Old eejit.”

“Good boy,” the man said. “What the fuck are you doing on foreign ground? Do you even know who it belongs to?”

“I know. And do you know who I am?” Ray asked softly.

“I don’t have a fucking clue, mister faggot hairdo. Instead I know there are three of you. You, in the bathroom, come out, and don’t do anything stupid.”

It was the comment about the hair that made Coach vaguely recognise. The voice, speaking manner, dislike for well-groomed fellas – it was all familiar.

“I’m coming out!” Coach warned pushing the bathroom door. He didn’t even pull out the gun, which highly disappointed Ray. Coach winked at him. “Hello, Tony, son.”

Their faces were priceless: Ray crazily opened his mouth, Tony blinked with his cow eyes, and Jim… Jim completely went into prostration. His gun was on the floor, but they’d deal with it later.

“Bloody hell, Coach, why are you here?”

“It’s nothing, on business,” he shrugged. “We need the information on the fella who got this room. We are harmless, didn’t want any problems, you know.”

Tony gave Ray the eye. His face was showing the will to put this fucking place upside down and didn’t relate to ‘harmless’ at all. He was still on his knees, because Tony hadn’t still put away the gun, though wasn’t aiming at him.

“All right, I suggest we all calm down, hide the guns and forget about this nonsense, yeah?”

“No shit, Coach!” Tone smiled, put his gun into the waistband and reached out to him: “How long it’s been!”

Coach humbly sank into his bear hug. Tony, a huge guy, six feet tall, was as innocuous for friends as bloodlust in the ring. Coach warmly patted him on his back, enjoying the absurd of the situation and Ray’s complicated face. He had already got up to his feet and started squeamishly dusting down his jeans.

“Two years, Tony, it’s been only two years. Glad, it was you who crashed the party, not someone from your gang.”

“Nah,” he objected, finally ending the hug. “It’s personal, Ashlie called, she’s my fiancée… So I came.”

“The girl from reception, then,” Ray finally spoke. He sighed: “I liked her, no questions, and she took the money.”

Tony threateningly turned to him:

“If you lay a finger on…”

“Calm down, son, we won’t touch Ashlie. By the way, that’s my friend, Raymond and this is Jim…”

“New generation?” he sniffed relaxing again. “He’s clearly at odds with guns.”

Jim visibly tensed up, looking at the floor embarrassed. Ray unexpectedly protected him:

“You just caught us off guard.”

He came up to the door and picked up the gun, put it into the pocket ridding Jim from touching it. He continued:

“All right let’s leave nostalgic talks for later, we need to finish here, I promised Ashlie to deal with it in an hour. You, Tony, had better go and tell her everything’s fine, just in case. We’ve had enough of unexpected meetings, right?”

The way Ray stopped the chaos around him and transformed it into effectiveness amused Coach. Though, it wasn’t only for Ray’s professional skills.

“By the way, which entry did you use?” Jim suddenly asked. “Haven’t you blot out Primetime?”

And then Tony shyly smiled showing his bruised knuckles.

Already in the car, after saying good-bye to Tony and Ashlie, bringing Primetime back to his senses, tending to his broken nose, and after finding nothing interesting in the room, Coach briefly told the boys the full story.

“So, you had a lot of fun, while we were bored to death,” Benny stated displeased.

“Especially Primetime,” Mel snorted and was punched in the ribs with an elbow. “Hey!”

“Are you bored?” Ray sweetly wondered. “Take the magazines, look through them, maybe you’ll find some colouring pages.”

Without looking he threw some magazines, for whatever reason he took from the hotel, to the backseat. It should have been he was going to examine them closely under a magnifying glass, like it could help.

“Take a good look, there might be clues,” Coach said casually, not really expecting anything at all.

But when ten minutes later Mel asked for a piece of paper and a pencil, that actually were found in the glove box, a miracle happened. On the shaded piece of paper, that was put on top of the stack, ‘11’ was lightening up, the set of six numbers followed, it looked like the number of the storage cell and the password.

Ray immediately parked the car to switch with Coach and started calling his people and giving them orders. The terminal in the shopping mall was active, so all of their conclusions yet didn’t contradict to reality.

The boys in the backseat got silent. Coach was watching the road and asking himself when he had managed to become a hero not only of some cheap criminal comedy but also of a detective story.


	7. Training

They got lucky with the weather: it was gloomy, but it wasn’t raining or nastily drizzling. So that the sun wasn’t blinding, letting them aim comfortably, and the absence of precipitations made English autumn a bit more tolerable.

The wasteland, that was chosen by him several years ago as a shooting range, was still deserted and empty: there was only dead wood, a small cleared site and kegs on the other side of the improvised range. Benny and Jim were setting up targets, while the others were loading the guns, showing off on camera – sure, they couldn’t lose the opportunity to make some shots for the music video. And Coach allowed them, since it was not the worst thing the Toddlers could film for youtube lately. He had sports license for Beretta, and he didn’t need one for small calibre pneumatic.

They used to gather like this long before: he himself taught many of his boys to shoot, those who hadn’t learned before they met, but wanted to learn. They wanted to for different reasons: some of them were just interested or wanted to show off, others wanted to feel safe, though the feeling was false. After all, in Coach’s gym there were no loved, wealthy kids from families with heavy purse. No, there were none, ever. Some teenagers from low places added up, those who were looking for things to do and for purpose, wanted to survive and grow older in the world they were born in. The teenagers were older and younger, boys and girls – Coach neither separated them nor divided, only making a difference in physical activity.

For what it was worth, Coach couldn’t only focus on amateur MMA, the Repton club always had another side. Well-schooled fighters with some brains and ideas in their heads for sure became a legend in their crappy neighbourhood and became a force everyone had to reckon with. Coach quickly became a nearly cult figure, known to everyone in small circles of their dirty blocks. He had no other choice but accept it. He was just living his second life in such a world where contact with criminal was inevitable, that was it. And being honest to the end, he enjoyed it.

Sure, his best guys had to know how to handle a gun. Sometimes too much was at stake to rely on fists and fair fight alone. So, he taught them everything.

The Toddlers had nothing left to be taught. He just used the excuse that it was necessary they practiced, and it was not like he had to talk some of them into it. Everyone was happy shitless, except for Jim – it was because of him Coach organised this trip.

“You’re taking on too much,” Ray said when they got back from the hotel and stayed in the car alone. “You can’t save them from everything, you can’t solve all the world problems by words only. And you shouldn’t.”

Ray was too kind to him.

They discussed Jim, and the way things could have turned out, if someone else broke into the room, not Tony. The way Coach let go of the situation, and what it could lead to. On a global scale Ray’s words maybe were true, but not in Jim’s case: they should have talked long ago.

“Jim,” Coach called as soon as the guy was free. “Just a quick word.”

The boys looked at each other and kept quiet. Everyone understood everything, Coach didn’t have to explain - when one of the gears of a well-set mechanism had an issue – everyone also noticed it. He saw that the boys were concerned for Jim each in their own way. And he knew that he, as an adult, should deal with this.

“You’re overthinking, Coach,” Jim said sitting down on a folding chair. “It won’t happen again.”

“I know, son. Have some tea.”

He slid a cup into his hands and poured some strong earl grey from thermos. The weather was whispering that they’d feel as cold as ice without it in a quarter of an hour. They spent a couple of minutes in silence sipping the tea and watching Ernie shoot the targets: quickly, aptly, effortlessly.

“Criminal isn’t your cup of tea,” Coach finally started speaking. “Look, Ernie feels high from this adrenaline, chases, guns. But not you.”

Jim just shrugged his shoulder, neither agreeing nor objecting. He watched Benny get into position, stretch out his hand aiming. Anyway, Jim shuddered from a shot.

“I think that you took the machine gun then just to prove to yourself that you can, didn’t you?” Coach didn’t wait for an answer. “You can, son, but you don’t want it. It’s commendable.”

“I didn’t chicken out,” Jim said for no reason. “I killed them.”

“And it will never change.”

Jim shuddered, burrowed his forehead into his folded hands, still gripping the empty cup with his fingers.

“I killed too,” Coach confessed.

When he had no other options, he had to talk about himself and expose his half-forgotten past. It was an equivalent exchange: information for information, pain for pain. Furthermore, he was the role model for his boys. And they had to know Coach wasn’t perfect too.

“I’m talking not only about these two Russians,” he clarified. “And it will always be the thing I know about myself. But it’s still me, and you are you. You should live your life so that you become happy, do your thing, and not endlessly regret things and be afraid, son.”

Coach squeezed his shoulder, unaware what else to say to reach him. But he didn’t have to: Jim finally started speaking.

“When I take the gun, it seems, I’m gonna kill someone else. I don’t want it anymore. The first week I constantly had nightmares.”

He spoke unevenly, forcing out every following confession. He had nightmares and he saw dead people – he hadn’t even remembered the faces of those two who were in Pearson’s car, but he knew it was them. When he pointed the gun at Tony, he nearly threw up…and he nearly pulled the trigger.

After all Jim fell silent and Coach just grabbed him in embrace, braced him against his shoulder feeling Jim eventually stop shaking.

“It’s not about the gun, think about it. It won’t shoot on its own, your intention is what important, son. You control the gun, not the gun controls you.”

Jim was listening and calming down. Coach hesitated before continuing:

“Now, when you work for Mickey, the gun is a required self-defence measure, just to scare off the guys like Tony. You won’t have to kill anyone. Ray promised.”

“Do you trust him?” Jim suddenly asked.

“I do,” Coach answered without hesitation.

Jim nodded. The answer satisfied him, and Coach was happy he didn’t have to explain where his trust in Raymond Smith came from. He didn’t fully understand it himself.

They sat a bit longer: Jim got away from the embrace, poured some more tea and started commenting on Mel’s approach. He couldn’t aim properly, disturbed by Primetime jumping around with camera and Ernie’s puns.

When Jim joined the others and carefully yet hesitantly got into position, his hands weren’t shaking. Coach understood, everything would be all right.

Right before leaving the shooting range, when the boys were loading the targets into the van, Coach received a message from Ray. Sometimes it seemed he was placed under surveillance: Ray was writing in time, when he had rare free minutes.

‘How was it?’

With a smile Coach looked at Benny and Jim going bloody nuts and with a pure heart typed: ‘It’s great. We’re leaving soon.’

‘Will you stop by in the evening?’

His heart started racing displeased, and Coach could only exhale a long breath. It was stupid to take the invitation as something personal: maybe the case had moved on during the day, and Ray wanted to discuss it with him.

‘Any news?’ Coach typed.

Ray’s people opened the storage cell yesterday: the password was right, like in some damn detective story. There was nothing that could directly point to Matthew, only ten thousand quid in an inconspicuous bag and an envelope. The contents of the envelope were a fake passport and a ticket to New York for today’s morning. It all wasn’t as interesting as the envelope itself; it was the same as those in which Matthew was sending his letters – empty but with signature seal. And still it was nothing of an evidence for Russians.

The phone buzzed in his hands, disturbing Coach from further thinking. A concise ‘No’ lit up on the screen.

Writing ‘All right’ wasn’t easy, his fingers were stubbornly missing the right buttons.

***

At the very Ray’s house Coach suddenly wanted to turn around and go back home. After all, he had a busy day, Ray must have had too. The absence of news, regarding that they had four days left to find the man who ordered the hit, was worth reading that way. And he himself after the shooting range and evening trainings in the gym had no energy for ambiguous talks and self-control.

But anyway, he got out of the car into cold autumn evening and headed to the house. There was no security around: nobody came out to meet him as usual, and Coach made a mental note to discuss it. If necessary, he would tell Ray all that he thinks about such recklessness.

Stepping through the doorway of the house, he habitually took of his shoes, took off his coat and hung it on a hanger held out by Ray – it was all under his stare. When they didn’t go anywhere, Coach got confused:

“What is our plan?”

Ray said the thing Coach didn’t expect to hear:

“Just kiss me. If you want it.”

For a moment it seemed to Coach that his mind started hallucinating and shattering into pieces, changing the facts. He just lost his bloody mind from anxiety, tiredness or glitched feelings. But Ray was looking at him, not taking his hungry gaze off him, and he seemed utterly honest in the dim light of the hall.

He didn’t need to ask Coach twice. He pulled Ray close so hard, Coach nearly blacked out himself. And kissed him.

They kissed like there was nothing else they knew how to do – they only leaned into each other, twisted their tongues and tried to find their rhythm, which wouldn’t seem like a try to smother. They ran out of oxygen quickly, there was little touching from the very beginning. Coach didn’t understand at once they were walking somewhere – strategic retreat to the kitchen was Ray’s genious plan.

They were wiping the walls with their bodies, because they couldn’t walk straight. Pulling away from another’s mouth, looking around, controlling their whereness – who needed it? On their way they knocked off the umbrella stand, a picture and lost Ray’s glasses. For payback he bit Coach’s lower lip and made a sound that seemed like a giggle.

In the kitchen there was a long, solid-looking cutting table. Its surface turned out to be empty – there was no bowls with nuts, fruit vases, which were good enough of the reference for life-pictures, no cutting boards or cups. There was only the built-in sink, that couldn’t go anywhere, and it was all.

Coach sat Ray down on the opposite edge of the table and found himself in the ring of arms and legs, palmed tense hips. Through the thinnest wool of Ray’s trousers, he could feel every sculptured muscle and shiver. Coach was shaking too, like a junkie that was promised a hit.

Ray’s mouth was hot, wet, he was doing hell of a thing with his tongue. He peeled off Coach’s jacket, his fingers went down under his t-shirt, caressing his ribs. Coach just undid the button and unzipped Ray’s trousers and not without his help pulled them down. They fell down on the floor like a useless rag. Ray pulled back for a moment and took something out of his jacket pocket – condoms and lube.

“I don’t like to save for later things I want now,” he said barely audible.

“Did you plan this?” Coach breathed out crazily.

At once he got high and dizzy, like some kid. He couldn’t recall if something like that ever happened when he was young and came to an unreliable conclusion that it never happened: he didn’t have Raymond Smith back then. Who was laughing right into his lips:

“One of us should plan… Shall we?”

“And who’s on top?” Coach clarified just in case, wanting to make sure he got everything right. And with sweet terror realized that if not, then screw it.

“You. This time.”

From the promise between the lines a tight hot knot tied up in his chest, his thoughts started rushing like birds that lost their guide. Coach trying to reboot, again licked Ray’s mouth – he gave in, let Coach take off his jacket and in return pulled down his pants. Coach stepped out of them, blindly booted them aside, kicking over an empty trash bin.

‘We’d else fuck in the pantry, when there’s bed,’ he thought meaninglessly not really going to change anything.

He took off his underwear himself, got rid of Ray’s too, while he was opening a condom. Coach got a bit uncomfortable from Ray’s immodest sigh and interested gaze. His cock was so hard it pressed to his belly and left precome stains on the t-shirt, Ray carefully covered the tip with his palm and in one long move rolled the condom down, then confessed, wiping out Coach’s concern:

“Just like I imagined. You never disappoint, do you?”

All the lightbulbs in Coach’s head went off. He helplessly caught on Ray’s words: ‘What do you mean imagined?’. Then it occurred to him that in his life there were many times he was the reason for people’s disappointment, but never in bed.

He didn’t want to disappoint Raymond Smith ever in whatever it could be - he decided before he laid Ray face down on his own jacket.

Ray’s ass was on point, but it was expected. But the way Ray obediently sprawled out on the wooden tabletop wasn’t.

The lube was a bit cold, thick and quickly melting on fingers. Nervously tracing Ray’s back, Coach confessed:

“Being honest, my experience with men goes not further than watching gay porn.”

Ray got up, looking over his shoulder:

“Doesn’t matter. It won’t be complicated.”

Coach’s vision, formed by relevant literature and cinema of erotic genre, said that after all, it wasn’t easy. He needed to stretch him just so, that there wouldn’t be any discomfort; find that line where you already could continue, and which wouldn’t look like an appointment with proctologist. In a perfect world, your partner should be satisfied from fingers only.

But it was really easy with Ray. He was soft, pliable and was letting in without resistance, laid himself open, sensitively reacting to every move. It seemed like he was properly prepared, already stretched, and from this assumption only Coach wanted to die. Anything would be better than feeling the arousal tying tighter from the mere thought of how exactly Ray was preparing.

Right at that minute, when Coach agreed to stop by, Ray already knew what he wanted from him. Coach added some lube and gave him exactly this, changing his fingers for cock and pushing in with short careful thrusts. And still it was damn tight and hot.

He caught up Ray under the belly, controlling the moves not letting him hit the sharp table edge. And started fucking him boldly.

Ray’s broad back was covered by thinnest cotton of the shirt, which was sticking to the hot skin. Coach loved going down under it with his fingers, wrinkle it and caress wet lower back, touch shoulder blades and neck, still fucking Ray into the table. He was moaning, fucking back, thrashing about and from time to time slapping Coach on his thigh. He asked: faster.

Coach thought he’d go mad before Ray came.

After all, Coach impatiently pulled him halfway from the table, pulled him close and pressed his chest to Ray’s back. Two short touches to Ray’s cock were enough to make him come. For Coach it was a couple of thrusts and hot semen that spilled on his palm.

“Will you change the table now?” Coach asked barely remembering how to talk.

Ray was cleaning off the tabletop with tissues and looked… he looked stunning. He was wearing only a shirt, that could barely cover his naked ass, his hair was dishevelled, and he wasn’t wearing glasses. To his surprise, Coach understood that actually he was wearing his – otherwise he wouldn’t have seen his handprint on light skin.

“You still haven’t understood,” Ray chuckled, leaving balled up tissues on the table. “Shower?”

It wasn’t the first time Coach noticed how strange Ray’s love for cleanliness worked: as Bunny said he would shoot anyone who went into the house in shoes, and then he would just indifferently clean off semen from the table with tissues and leave cleaning for the next day. He even asked Coach to take a shower not before, but after. Ray’s utmost neatness wasn’t really strong and obviously it was very amenable.

They left the clothes on the kitchen floor, went into the bathroom half-naked and for a long time lazily kissed under the warm shower. They both weren’t ready for the second round; it was a hard day and so little time had passed from the first one. But Coach anyway caressed all he could reach, exploring and trying to memorize, just because he could. Because Ray let him and exposed himself and touched him in return.

Then they made it to the bedroom, and eventually had sex for the second time, though Coach thought it was just a dream. He didn’t remember falling asleep and was nearly surprised when he woke up next to Ray.

For a while Coach was watching his face, relaxed in his sleep. Most in this world he wanted it to happen again and again.


	8. Calm

Ray declined the offer to help with breakfast.

“If you don’t want to know you’re slicing the tomatoes not tiny enough, let me do everything myself,” he said with no offence, and Coach laughed sitting at the table.

He watched Ray fastly and confidently take out ingredients, set the dishes, spoons, spatula and whisk so that they were at hand. He was choosing spices so pedantically like he was going to film a cooking show. And to say the truth he was lacking only the camera: Ray was cooking as aesthetically as he did anything else.

He was cleverly wielding the knife, whisk and all he laid his hands on. Coach was even more excited that Ray was from time to time fixing his gaze on the right side of the table, blacking out for seconds. Ray washed it first thing, but it wasn’t enough: Coach himself came back to the thoughts of yesterday’s evening. And night. And how he unbearably wanted to touch Ray instead of just looking at him.

Surprisingly, he didn’t feel the smallest discomfort or regret. Ray’s warm look after he woke up, his smile told Coach more than any words. He didn’t want to give a name to the things happening between them, find a suitable category or definition – the only important thing was the feeling, that everything went right. He especially didn’t want to think seriously about future.

The time was ruthlessly nearing nine am. Pushing away the remorse, Coach wrote to Ernie asking to open the gym instead of him. It was a pity Ray’s business couldn’t stand such breadth.

By the fifth minute of cooking Coach was tired from inaction and had courage to ask:

“So how thin should I cut tomatoes?”

Ray answered without hesitation:

“One fifth of an inch.”

Coach could bet ten quid that somewhere in Ray’s fiddly mind there was a table of recommended cutting thickness of vegetables in accordance to the chosen dish. The worst part was that it didn’t irritate Coach.

“I can do that,” he promised with a grin, getting closer to Ray. “May I?”

Ray just gave him a cutting board, a knife, a big tomato and a warning: “You’ve got one minute”. Coach finished faster, carefully checking the thickness of every slice because he knew Ray wasn’t joking.

“Perfect,” he praised, putting the tomatoes into barely fried egg mix. “Spinach next.”

“Any special instructions?”

“Stop testing my patience?” Ray rolled his eyes.

They were exchanging meaningless phrases cooking side by side. Coach was on standby and was trying to maintain Ray’s habitual order and not screw anything up, but anyway he felt involved into process. It was so cosy and homey. After one try to relate these two words to Raymond Smith someone other would go nuts. But Coach liked it, after all, he went nuts long ago.

When they were arguing if they should add more salt into the omelette Fletcher walked in on them - incredibly annoying, perceptive and obscenely smiling Fletcher.

“Oopsie,” he said, no shadow of remorse, and stood still in the kitchen doorway. “Ray, before you throw that knife at me, I want to assure you that I’m here because of urgent work issues. Put it down, okay?”

Ray didn’t put away the knife, he just blatantly swung it in his hand.

“In fact, I’d like to fall on another knife of yours, ten times, I hope everyone got the reference,” Fletcher grinned. He immediately changed his face expression for a sad one: “But I guess I’m late.”

Ray didn’t comment on the allusion, he only offered:

“How about you leave what you’ve brought and fuck off, and then I’ll pretend you haven’t spoiled my morning.”

The question hung in the air, senseless and hopeless. Coach let their word fight hang out and just started serving omelette – anyway they seemed to stop noticing him. It hurt his pride a bit, but that was it.

“I want breakfast too.” Fletcher finally said.

Ray’s hand with a knife, still clutched in it, twitched, and Coach hurried to take it away:

“No murders before meal, I beg you. After – so be it, I’ll help you to get rid of the body.”

“I’ve got freezer for it,” Ray said quietly, turning to the kettle.

Coach winced displeased, remembering Aslan junior: after he knew all about his miserable fate, he made a decision to never look into Ray’s freezer. Never. Judging by Fletcher’s distorted face he also knew how the freezer was used in this house.

After all, Ray gave up:

“Fletcher, if you want to eat, wash your hands first.”

“Yes, mommy,” he laughed, immediatelyturning tail. “How about coffee?”

“A little longer and it will be on your pants,” Ray answered automatically, stirring the salad. “In my house there’s only tea in the morning.”

Then there was a scream coming from the hall already: “Prude!”, and Ray hissed, adding olive oil and wine vinegar into salad. He didn’t seem as tense as minute before, and he was hardly pleased by Fletcher’s presence. Or by the fact that now he knew about their relationship and could breathe a word to Mickey.

“Is it a problem?” Coach made a vague gesture with his hand in the direction of the hall.

“Fletcher is always a problem,” Ray answered leaving the bowl with salad. “And this is not.”

His hand landed on Coach’s t-shirt collar, slipped to his neck and then to the back of his head and insistently pressed, making him get closer. They kissed quickly, sneakily like some schoolboys, but even in this there was something special. Maybe it was Ray’s mouth or his laughing eyes.

And then Fletcher came back, and they sat at the table – it was a quite strange company if not hinky. Fletcher tried the omelette, rolled his eyes and murmured something amused. Coach made out something about ‘wife’ and decided he just imagined it. Ray just coldly smiled in response and advised Fletcher to shut his mouth. Coach still preferred to pretend that nothing, nada bothered him.

The omelette was predictably tasty, so that Fletcher shot up for five minutes. So it was a shame he had to share his portion, but after all, the detective started speaking about work and it became clear: he visited not for nothing.

The detailed plan of Matthew Berger’s mansion, the quantity of the security and their timetable, technical equipment, the timetable of Matthew himself – it was all definitely useful. If Mickey wouldn’t give a flying fuck about his peaceful plans and search of evidence for Russians. That was what Coach said.

“I couldn’t agree more,” Fletcher nodded.

Ray looked away from the photos on the table and looked at him as if he couldn’t understand why Fletcher was still here. Detective snapped:

“I haven’t finished my tea. And moreover, I’ve seen it all with my own eyes and I can be useful.”

“So finish it in silence,” Coach intervened, tired from these ongoing squabbles. “Ray, I’ll say it once again. Beating out the confession from Matthew with force – is a bad decision.”

“We’ve got four days including this one,” Ray said seriously. “There’s nothing to wait for. The only thing we know, Matthew is the mastermind, so we need to make a plan how to smoke him out.”

And though, a bad feeling didn’t let go of him, Coach had to agree: planning ahead the worst outcome for lack of another one was reasonable.

“Right. Just take your time.”

“We need to discuss everything with Michael. Fletcher, leave them under surveillance, keep working off your sins. Coach…” he paused, like he lost the trail of thoughts. “It’s nothing, we’ll get in touch at noon.”

You could see the wheels turning in Ray’s head; he was already working with the given information, he was putting a strategy in his head, which would let them achieve their goal. He was making up and giving up on options, counting time and variables, which he would have to control. Coach knew they had to just leave and not bother him.

“We’re leaving, Ray,” he said, insistently dragging Fletcher away from the table. He hardly resisted, just clutched the teacup, finishing his tea. “I’ll be in touch.”

Their first shared breakfast finished not like he wanted. Not only Ray went deep down into his work and didn’t even nod him goodbye, but the breakfast itself was totally spoiled by Fletcher. Who now kept up beside him either not wanting to explain himself to Ray’s security which was on duty already or he didn’t want to let him go easily.

Already after the gates Fletcher finally knew how to fuck him up:

“Does Ray also call you ‘Coach’ in bed? If I were you, I’d be offended.”

He neatly lit a cigarette and took a show off drag; even with a cigarette in his teeth he managed to grin acidly. Coach patted him on the shoulder with fake pity:

“If you were me, you’d shit yourself from happiness, Fletcher. But…”

He made a gesture with his hands, like saying ‘but you’re not me’, winked at Fletcher and headed to the car. The sound of his voice followed:

“Don’t get too excited, it won’t be easy with Ray!”

When he looked back, Fletcher’s grin faded. Coach nodded him goodbye and looked away again, taking out the car keys.

Sure, he perfectly knew it himself.

***

If in the morning Coach caught everyone’s attention by his encouraged look, then by the evening everyone avoided him like the plague. The fall from the height of good mood to the bottom lasted the whole day, and still was too steep. Too steep for Coach to make himself believe everything was all right.

Ray still hadn’t written first, and as an answer to the question about business, Coach received a versatile ‘Working’. Ray’s work could imply whatever you could think of: fuss with payments and contracts, assisting Mickey at meetings, check up of any of farms, and also cover-up of yet another body and working-out of a plan of invasion into guarded mansion. And something, maybe, Ray’s reluctance to let Coach into their business, could tell him that he was doing exactly the last.

Paranoia that came out of nowhere was literally screaming that no good would come out from this idea about Matthew, but Coach still didn’t have any other ideas. Though the problem wasn’t only in bad feeling: Coach selfishly wanted Ray’s attention, which was stupid but true.

When Ernie and Primetime came up to him with concern on their faces, Coach understood it was time to get himself together.

“Coach, did something happen?”

“Now the kill for stupid questions will happen,” Primetime mumbled, nudging Ernie. “I told you it was a bad idea. Coach we’ll better…”

“Breathe out, son,” Coach advised to Primetime. Lied a bit: “Nothing happened, the mood is a bit shitty, that’s it.”

Primetime just mumbled: “Yeah, a bit”, and Ernie smiled. They looked at each other, nudged each other – Coach was watching these children and understood they had something up.

“C’mon, tell me. You’re not just interested, you’ve got a specific offer, right?”

By the lightened faces of Ernie and Primetime and greedy looks of everyone who was still in the gym, he guessed what he’d hear:

“How about sparring?”

Coach grinned bloodthirstily. If he hadn’t received better offers that evening, then why not?

His last time in the ring as sparring partner was not long ago – before the story with Mickey Pearson’s farm. Before he met Ray, Phuc-jumper, pig farm, search of Fletcher’s cases, two killed Russians, suppers, hotel… But the feelings stayed the same. It didn’t matter how the life or he himself changed, the only thing constant was the thrill, maximum concentration, confidence before the fight.

Ernie wasn’t smiling anymore, concentrated on the coming round. Around the ring there were viewers crowding: everyone who hadn’t gone home and even some who came back. The Toddlers again were as a whole and were shouting louder than the others, setting up cameras: Coach could only marvel at their ability to make a show of ordinary sparring – they were only lacking selling the tickets.

Contact lenses made his eyes a bit dry, the helmet made his head a bit heavier, boxing gloves fit perfectly. This fight meant nothing: Coach’s prestige wouldn’t waver, even if he lost. When he lost. After all, Ernie was in his best shape before the competition, and Coach was coach to give advice and teach technique, and not box himself every day.

Finally, it was less loud, and Mel commanded:

“Box!”

Ernie was taller, younger and in better shape, and because of this after hesitation he attacked first. Coach’s advantage was experience and year-old reflexes: few people could catch him off guard and certainly not in the very beginning. The crowd murmured, when Coach dodged for the fourth time and finally decided to counterattack. Ernie stepped back, made a false punch, but Coach didn’t buy it – the real fight began.

In the gym it was improper to ask questions about past: neither ask each other nor Coach, whose personality was wrapped in mystery. He himself never pried out what lead another angry teen to him – time passed and they told him themselves and he listened and tried to understand.

But anyway, there were brave guys who asked to return sincerity. One and all asked: “Why box? How did you start?”. And then Coach would speak for long about character-building, body shape, basic essentials, until he would move on to existential assumptions about martial arts synergy. And only in the end he would slip that he got to the gym when he was a teenager and then never left. He kept his mouth shut about the hard choice between athletic career and proper reliable work, following regrets, changes in his life, when he was dragged from the bottom by sport only as it was the only constant left.

First five minutes flew by. Coach knew he was winning on points. The people around the ring were going crazy, Ernie was wiping his face with a towel – nothing left of Coach’s foul mood. It wasn’t necessary to beat the crap out of the punching bag to blow off steam: a thoughtful sparring was always more effective.

He lost the second round under pressure of Ernie burning, only once counterattacking successfully – bounce-back, feint, punch to solar plexus and immediately front body kick – and he himself got a couple of blows. And then, when Ernie successfully got him into joint lock, he had to tap the mat with his hand, though in the old days he would have tried something. But now he was careful with his back.

He also didn’t have to compete the younger fighter in endurance, so in the first half of the third round he bet all on technique and analysis trying to save strength. His prudence proved itself with points (though they clearly knew who lead on points) and made Ernie even angrier. Cold head he was thinking better, but wasn’t that insistent: finally, he caught Coach up in the corner and did a great job of series. Everything ended in clinch when the time was up, when Coach was totally exhausted and promised to give up agreeing on such ventures.

Nevertheless, it was a good sparring. Coach predictably lost.

“Ernie, in the first round you were too hasty,” he said spitting out the mouth guard and taking off the helmet. “You didn’t have to force, but make me attack, provoke me for a mistake.”

“How could I,” Ernie snorted. “I thought if you were in bad mood you wouldn’t hold back.”

“Thinking with your head is not ‘holding back’,” Coach corrected him, slapping Ernie on a thigh with a glove. “Right, if anyone else wants – in you go, we’re staying till midnight.”

The crowd started shouting even louder, queuing up. Coach jumped off from the ring feeling new again.

The message from Ray caught him at home, when he was tired and dreaming to fall asleep faster. It wasn’t helping at all:

“It was hot. Will your boys now supply me with porno-karate starring you by night?”

Primetime did good job with the video: he was editing it for more than an hour, egged on by Ernie’s and Jim’s critic. Though Coach hadn’t seen this piece of art in full, he knew that the soundtrack was some fucking awful rap song. He was amused that after all of this they had courage to send this video to Raymond Smith.

“Did you like the soundtrack?” Coach typed. He couldn’t be angry for the daytime silence anymore.

He started to undress, glad he took the shower in the gym – he only had strength to make it to bed. Right there the answer caught him:

“Muted it on the tenth second. You had to be bolder in the second round.”

Coach snorted, surprised by the choice of the subject at one in the night. He knew all about his mistakes.

“Wanna discuss my technique?”

The next message from Ray completely took away his hope to fall asleep. Arousal flooded him in hot wave and settled in lower stomach. It was good it was just texting, bad – that Coach could perfectly imagine Ray’s low voice. The way he would say it aloud, properly making pauses and accents:

“I want to get the work done as fast as possible and to spar. Head-to-head. Not in your gym.”

“Sure thing,” Coach answered, getting into underpants with his fingers and caressing his semi-hard cock.

Because of Ray he felt like a schoolboy in the middle of puberty rather than a grown-up self-contained man. Only hope that it was mutual made him feel better.


	9. Storm

The morning that started with a ‘good morning’ from Ray and thoughtful wank in the shower couldn’t turn into a bad day. That was what Coach thought, waving off a bad feeling and trying to stay in right mind, right up to the moment Tony called.

“Hullo, Coach, how are you?”

Despite his calm voice, Coach didn’t feel right. His senses screamed with renewed vigour: Tony wouldn’t call him without a reason, it meant it was about their last meeting. Coach waved to Betty, cancelling the order and stepped away from the counter.

“All right, Tony. It’s not a social call, innit?”

“Yeah. I think you’ll be interested – it’s about the guy whose room you were searching through.”

“Bring it on,” Coach hurried him rougher than he wanted. Though, Tony wasn’t of a touchy kind.

“Anyway, Ashlie has a relief worker, and it was her shift when he checked in. She remembered that before he left, not for the last time, but in the evening…” he bumbled. Coach didn’t interrupt, carefully following the trail of thoughts. “So he left a notepad on reception. Millie put it into the table’s drawer, and forgot it, and today Ashlie came across it. Do you need it?”

Coach looked at the watch: half past one. It would be thirty minutes to the hotel, or an hour if there were traffic jams. He needed to call Ray, tell him to send someone from his people.

“I do. Did you look what’s inside?”

“Well, yeah… Is that all right? There’s nothing really, only one sheet with some numbers… Pink, I noticed it at once.”

Sure. What else colour would it be?

“All right, Tony, I’d have anyway asked you to look. What’s on the sheet?”

“It’s written, wait,” there was noise in the speaker. “Eleven, then separately two, five, six…”

“Three, three, eight,” Coach finished from memory. Answering Tony’s amused wheezing he said: “Familiar numbers, never mind. Is there anything else?”

Tony was silent, only notepad pages rustling. Finally he said:

“Nope, that’s all. Pad looks like it’s fresh from the shop, smells nice, with ink.”

Coach pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to wrap his head around the received information.

“Thank you, Tony. Send me the pic of the sheet, yeah? And I’ll write you about the pad, keep it near, all right?”

“Consider it done,” Tony assured him and hung up.

Coach was looking hazily into the phone for a couple of seconds, and then found himself at the table by the window. He didn’t even notice sitting down, taken with the talk. Betty was standing still at the counter, looking at him worriedly, he had to nod to her that it was all right.

It wasn’t all right. The pad was the last drop that made the cup of absurd run over. The row of the killer’s fuck ups was too stupid – or those were not fuck ups at all. They intentionally left the coordinates of the cell: the killer would have just lost his phone, for sure he wasn’t going to die. Is seemed strange from the very beginning: why would you take a pic of a set of numbers, if you could just google them and remember the address. But it seemed like someone wanted to play the detective.

Then on reception they must have gotten the said to be forgotten notepad (right there, they could have cleaned the room, and it must have been the notepad, no one would keep a solo sheet). That way they would get the information about the cell, like from Matthew for the killer – and would find there an envelope with his sealing. Disturbingly easy, but Matthew was such a convenient enemy for Michael, that they made him the lead suspect from the first pink paper.

And the funniest thing: if not for Ray’s paranoia and Mel’s quick thinking, they would have found the password right at this moment. And they wouldn’t have understood that the killer had written on the paper himself.

His head started aching from confused thoughts. Coach felt he was missing something else, some interim logical link, but a firm conclusion still appeared in his head: it wasn’t Matthew responsible for the assault, but that one, who decided to set them against each other. And also set Mickey against Russians, and may the best win (better if they shot each other) – a perfect multi-move combination.

As bad luck would have it, Ray’s phone was outside home service area. Coach started anxiously calling him in messenger – nothing again. He ran to the car, on his way looking at the photo from Tony: familiar pink paper, same numbers, same location and writing, that was left on the magazine gloss. Which was to be proved.

Ray wasn’t answering, which didn’t bode well. Already in the car Coach understood that in the very beginning of this foul-up with the farm, he had Mickey’s phone number leaked, but he never got to use it. Coach found it in contacts and pressed call – surprisingly, Mickey answered after three tones. Apparently, he knew that even an unknown caller wouldn’t bother him over a petty business.

“Yeah?”

“Michael? It’s Coach,” he breathed out in relief, turning the engine on. “Is Ray around?”

“Coach? I don’t remember to…”

“Michael, I’m serious, where’s Ray now?”

There was silence in the speaker – probably Mickey was fighting the urge to tell him to fuck off and hang up, or he was just thinking where to bury him. Coach nervously tapped the steering wheel. The running car kept devouring fuel.

“Is there something I need to know?” Mickey asked after all.

“There is. I’m ninety percent sure that Matthew has nothing to do with all of this,” he tried to speak as confidently as he could. It was too hard to explain all the details to Mickey. “It’s a long story, but there’s proof: he was framed. Like you with Russians.”

“It’s not meant for the phone,” Mickey interrupted him. And said the thing Coach was afraid to hear: “Ray must be there. At Matthew’s.”

Coach switched the call to loudspeaker mode, threw the phone on the passenger seat and rode out from the parking lot in front of the café. He remembered the address by heart.

“I’m going there.”

“No, get to Moscow road, explain these ninety percent,” Mickey started arguing.

“There’s no time,” he said firmly. “It’s clearly not Matthew. I can tell you everything on the phone, but it’s unsafe, will take long, and moreover I’m driving. Better tell me what to expect. Did you take the mansion by storm?”

“No, we didn’t. Ray took some documents for Matthew,” Mickey said. His voice was tired. He gave up. “Some agreements so that the revenue had questions to neither of us. Matthew agreed for a tete-a-tete meeting. But there are some of our boys – they must go there and get rid of the security as soon Ray gets inside.”

It took Coach everything in his power not to curse Mickey out, because he deserved it: letting Ray go almost alone, covering up by papers! To the territory of the man who, as they thought, wanted to get even with them.

“Is there any way to reach them?”

“No, Ray warned that there would likely be a jammer. Frazier is moving out. It’s the last time I ask you: are you sure it’s not Matthew?”

“I’ll be there in twenty,” Coach said again tightly.

He was shaking from nervousness and anger, and he also was followed by the feeling that Ray was in danger. Even if in the beginning Matthew had nothing against them, now he would feel like a cornered animal – and those are extremely dangerous. He just wished Ray wouldn’t underestimate him.

“Relax, Coach,” Mickey said suddenly. “If you need to save someone there, that’s Matthew.”

From Ray’s hands. Mickey was speaking so easily about it, like it wasn’t enough: Ray could have just killed the innocent and fucked up all the work on restoration of peace. Could have spilled blood and then blamed himself for failure.

In all this story about selling the business Coach was surprised that, according to Ray’s words, Micky was trying not to get blood on his hands – and at the same time he didn’t think about hands of his people. As if Raymond Smith didn’t give a shit how many people he would kill for his boss. It was all a lie: Ray was still keeping Aslan’s lighter in his pocket, this old plastic cheapie. He said it himself, like it meant nothing, but Coach understood.

“Hey, you still there?”

“I think of how to keep myself from telling you that you’re a fucking snob, who doesn’t care about his people’s feelings,” Coach said in one breath. He got ahead of the car in front of him, breaking all the rules, and saying goodbye to his driver license in his mind. “Oopsie, it slipped out anyway.”

Instead of giving up on him, Mickey laughed. Coach just wanted to hang up, anyway there was no use from it – he’d better calmly make up his mind. Not on the way he could curse out Mickey Pearson, tightening the rope on his neck, but on the plan of the house (office on the first floor, up the stairs, to the right), get prepared to what was to come. But Mickey spoke first:

“The day, when you shot two Russians, we stopped at the gas station, remember? You got out and I asked Ray if there was something between you two. Do you know the answer?”

Coach remembered the way Ray looked at him through the windshield. Heavy, peering look – as if he was rating if he was the right person he placed his bet on. Ray stayed alone with his boss for five minutes – why would Mickey ask him such things? Which arguments did Ray use to assure him?

And why did Mickey remember this talk right at that moment?

“So?” after all Coach gave up.

“He gave me with his most honest look and said that no,” Mickey laughed, keeping a pause. Emphasized: “Not yet.”

His ears started ringing. Coach was clearly underestimating Ray’s habit to plan everything and see ten steps ahead – did he know that day when he saved Ray’s life it would come out that way? Did he want Ray right then? If the answer to the first question was negative, the second one was only miserable ‘maybe’.

“Ray always gets what he wants, yeah?” Coach broke the prolonged silence.

“That’s right,” Mickey said. “So, probably, he’s done with Matthew.”

“We’ll see,” Coach said finally hanging up.

He wanted to reach this place as fast as he could and beat Ray’s stupid ass. For he didn’t mind the warning and rushed, but firstly for that he went there alone. Whether it was the wish to avoid arguing or he just didn’t want to drag him into another adventure, anyway it was a dirty thing to do.

The thing Coach wanted the most was to make it on time again.

***

Matthew Berger’s mansion looked like Mickey Pearson’s house with its three storeys and obvious expensiveness. Modern, clearly built like two years ago, not more, it fell short of pathos compared to renovated vintage building. Coach himself wouldn’t choose either of them – Ray’s house was better, smaller and simpler, though ten times more expensive than Coach could ever afford.

He waved off stupid thoughts, quickly getting out of the car. Judging by the parked cars, Ray’s people were inside, it meant that everything had begun.

Gates were open and Coach walked in unimpeded. Coach pulled the gun out from the waistband, hoping he wouldn’t need it, and pushed the door.

At the exact same second Bunny pointed the gun at him, showing perfect reflex and posture.

“Coach?”

He didn’t lower the gun. Coach threw his hands up just in case:

“Easy, Bunny, I’m friendly. I desperately need Ray, time is running out.”

“Ray ordered not to let anyone in. Nobody, even mister Pearson, if he decided to crash the party – that’s what he said.”

It was bad. Whatever Ray was going to do there – he didn’t want his people or his boss to see it. Though hardly anyone would stop Mickey if he appeared there.

“Bunny, I’ve got new information. Ray will now kill the innocent, and then Mickey and him will clean up this mess for a long time – fucking long time and hardly successful. Understand? I must stop him.”

“There’s been no order,” he continued being stubborn.

“You’ve got a jammer here, Mickey just can’t reach you,” Coach clarified patiently. Then he snapped: “Bunny, don’t play for time – just take the fucking responsibility and let me in!”

And it worked: Bunny, a giant six-feet tall man, got embarrassed. Coach skilfully finished him:

“C’mon, Ray will thank you for that later.”

And they went, and then ran when there was a scream coming from the first floor. Bunny was the first to reach the office’s door and burst his way through Ray’s security crowding in front of the door – nobody had courage to disobey the order.

“I’ll enter myself,” Coach said firmly. Whatever there was, Ray didn’t want any witness. “Bunny, I’ll call you.”

Coach predictably didn’t like what he saw in the office.

Ray was looming over Matthew, who turned out to be smaller and thinner than Coach imagined. He was pressing Matthew’s hand with his knee into the armchair’s armrest, holding a knife in his hand. Matthew’s wrist was covered in blood as Ray’s fingers, holding it. Ray himself was more scared than furious. It seemed he would throw up on Matthew what was left of his dinner, and the other wouldn’t even notice – he had already started passing out from pain.

“Ray!”

Ray sharply lifted up his head, shuddering with all his body. The look on his face changed to the lost childish expression like he was caught playing with matches. Or rather he was woken up from a nightmare.

“Ray, you don’t have to do this,” Coach said firmly. “Put down the knife.”

Ray started blinking frequently, as if he was trying to stay sane. There was a drop of blood on the right lens of his glasses. The office was a wreck: there was paper on the floor (must have been the agreement) and vase shards, one of the chairs was upside down and broken, at the very door there was a crashed black pair of glasses and something that looked like derringer. Gilded. Coach finally noticed that Ray was visibly beat up, and on Matthew’s cheek there was a fresh bruise: the fight was wicked.

“If you now start speaking of morality,” Ray finally started speaking, disturbing him from looking at the battlefield, “I’ll break your nose.”

His voice seemed normal but the look in his eyes didn’t.

“That’s not why I’m here. That wasn’t Matthew, there appeared new… circumstances. I asked you to wait.”

Ray breathed out madly, looked down on his own hands and Matthew’s cut wrist, and bitterly threw the knife away. He made a step, another one, till his back met the bookcase. His hands started shaking as if he was hysteric, his face went green – for a moment it seemed to Coach that he would throw up right there and then. Besides, Matthew should have been taken care of first.

“C’mon, clean your hands,” he said softly. “And I’ll bring the victim back to life. I’ll tell you everything after.”

Ray started feverishly crumpling the tissues, wiping off another’s blood from his hands. Coach knew that they were in need of water, soap and a pint of antiseptic. Just because Ray possessed an extremely strange neatness, close to disorder, that turned on only at the most stressful moments. The more insane it seemed that he wanted to do this on his own.

Despite Matthew’s pale look, the fact that he blacked out and blood, the wound wasn’t deep: Ray was trying to chop his wrist at the joint, but only made it to the first bone. It wasn’t surprising that Matthew was screaming - it was damn painful. Pity but not disgust to the thing Ray had been trying to do took over Coach - his moral compass was really bad.

Coach hurriedly took out the pocket square, twisted it, did a tourniquet and drew it tight. It was growing into a habit. Maybe in his next life he would work in ambulance: the latest events were screaming about it.

Coach stood straight and assured Ray:

“He’ll live.”

“Me too, don’t look at me like that,” Ray lopsidedly smiled. He was coming to his senses so fast it was clear – the throwback would happen later.

“And how do I look at you?” Coach asked, cleaning off his hands on Matthew’s soft pullover – it was ruined anyway.

“Like I’m a guilty kid, another Toddler,” Ray said. “Don’t.”

“I won’t,” Coach said not really sure he could keep a promise.

He looked out the door, asked Bunny to call in a doctor from his people and call Mickey – either leaving the zone of jammer or finally finding it and turning off.

In the office Ray was still leaning on bookcase, cleaning off his fingers with already pinkish tissue. It was the last one. Coach kicked the gun, that interested him, with his foot:

“What’s that? Does it shoot?”

“Paperweight,” Ray snickered. He explained: “But yes, it shoots – Rosalind killed two Chinese with a similar one. Didn’t I tell you?”

Now Ray seemed unhealthily active – and there was nothing good in it. They needed to finish as fast as they could and get away. Coach started searching the office for alcohol. Matthew was still unconscious, and he had to help him numb the pain beforehand.

“Let me tell the stories so far,” he sighed. “Tony called me not long ago. Ashlie’s relief worker, from the hotel reception, remembered that our killer forgot the notepad on the desk. Absolutely blank and unused – but with a curious attachment. Will you guess?”

“Let’s go without riddles, I can’t think straight,” Ray asked tiredly.

Coach’s heart sank, and he was glad he was standing with his back to Ray – he wouldn’t have liked what he saw.

“A pink paper sheet with the number of the cell and password. Same as we copied from magazine’s cover. So the killer left us a hint, and pink paper wasn’t only Matthew’s – someone else knew about his weird preferences. It was all set up, someone wanted to set Mickey against Matthew and Mickey against Russians.”

“Let’s say I got the point,” Ray said. “It turns out the main thing was that we got to the hotel ourselves. I need to find out from Fletcher who leaked him the address.”

The lost link in a chain was in its place now – that was what Coach was missing and knew it but couldn’t feel. Even in this state Ray could think better than him.

“And find out if someone threatened Matthew,” Ray continued.

Finally, he found a started bottle of whiskey and clean glasses in the drawer next to the table. Coach poured Ray a third, and a full to Matthew to thoroughly get him.

Coach came up to Ray, gave him the glass and stopped, couldn’t help the urge.

“May I?” he asked pointing to his glasses.

After getting the permission, Coach carefully lifted his glasses up by their ends. Ray frowned in confusion, but said nothing, watching Coach wipe off blood from the lens with the hemline of his shirt. Glasses off he seemed a bit defenceless and when Ray trustfully turned his face towards him letting put them back on – Coach couldn’t resist. He caressed hot skin behind his cute sticking out ears, slid his fingers to the neck and then under the collar of the shirt – Ray closed his eyes, wishing he was in another place.

“C’mon, drink it,” Coach said softly, hardly finding strength to step back.

He came back to Matthew, examined his still bleeding wound – no big deal. Matthew Berger really turned out to be not like Coach imagined. Maybe it was for the consequences, but now he seemed fragile and miserable, not that sly dog, who nearly fucked up Mickey Pearson. However, Coach dealt him two ringing slaps in the face – exceptionally for use.

Matthew started wriggling, opened his eyes, pink from tears, and blindly stared at Coach.

“Calm down, Matthew, everything’s gonna be fine from now on. Drink it.”

He held the glass to his dry chapped lips, and Matthew obediently took a sip, then winced and tried to look away. Coach didn’t let him, took hold of his chin and poured in the half of whiskey in one go, saying:

“C’mon, it won’t be so painful. You’ll lose a bit more blood, but fuck it, the doctor will come soon and stitch you up.”

Ray finally unglued himself from the bookcase, appearing in Matthew’s sight – he started wriggling, trying to escape, mumbled. Coach put away the glass and pushed Matthew into the armchair:

“Easy, Ray won’t touch you too. Now he believes you and he’s sorry for misunderstanding.”

“God, you speak to all of poor and sick like that,” Ray rolled his eyes. “Matthew, I won’t touch you with a finger, I promise. Just calm down.”

Ray was seriously treating with respect a man whose hand he tried to cut off. Coach couldn’t help but laugh – Matthew looked at him as if he was insane.

“I don’t understand what’s going on,” he said weakly, “but I guess you can let go of me. Moving is obviously not in my interest.”

Coach stopped gripping his shoulders, slid the glass in his healthy hand and stepped back – it wasn’t worth escalating the situation. Matthew was holding up pretty well for the one who had nearly lost his hand and still was in the same office with the offender. What else Ray did to him, trying to force out a confession, was left to imagination.

“You’re Coach,” Matthew suddenly recognized him. “Those Kalahari meerkats of yours held up Michael’s farm.”

“Yeah, with a touch of your hand, I know,” Coach nodded, though he didn’t catch the metaphor. Probably Matthew went into shock. “But let’s not talk about it. One should be able to forgive – for example, I recommend you forgive Ray. They tried to frame you, like Mickey – someone who equally loves both of you.”

“Then Michael and I are in the same boat again,” Matthew smiled suddenly.

He was recovering in a blink of an eye – his face went pink, and a glim in his eye appeared. Alcohol did its part. Alcohol or mentioning Mickey.

“Did anyone threaten you lately?” Ray didn’t like to waste time.

“Except for Micha-a-el?” Matthew said high as a kite. Sipped from the glass, wincing artistically. “I guess that my nearly ex-wife or father-in-law wouldn’t have the balls to get to you.”

“Let me rephrase,” Ray said patiently. “Who did you write letters on pink paper except for Michael?”

In Matthew’s dark eyes there was a glint of understanding. Ray noticed it and tensed up too, reached forward like a wild animal, who sensed prey. Without jokes, Matthew said:

“Chinese. I wrote to Silent Joe.”

Ray cursed and took to the glass. It all came together.

Coach terribly wanted to go home – far away from exhausted Matthew and his office, smelling of blood, all those intrigues and fucked up plans. He just wanted to grab Ray, take him to the car and drive away.

That was what he did.


	10. Bond

Ray blacked out as soon as they drove away from Matthew’s mansion. He was breathing hard with his nose, pressing his chin to his chest, and after one look at him Coach’s neck started aching. It was better than watching Ray wipe off his fingers – they ran out of antiseptic in the car’s first aid kit. They decided not to waste time and not return to Ray’s Mercedes.

When they were halfway there the phone rang – Coach hurriedly put his hand into Ray’s pocket, trying to watch the road only. The speed wasn’t high, he was driving inappropriately slowly.

Ray was so tired that he reacted neither to the call nor to Coach’s voice:

“Yeah?”

Of course, it was Mickey calling. Coach could bet his first question would be: ‘the hell did you go?’, but he pleasantly surprised him:

“Coach? Is Ray all right?”

“Fell asleep, as soon as he got into the car,” Coach answered softly, trying not to disturb Ray. “Physically he’s all right.”

“And not physically?”

“He tried to cut off Matthew’s hand,” Coach didn’t use gentler words. “What do you think?”

Coach didn’t see sense speaking formally to Mickey after he literally called him a fucking snob. Mickey, obviously, agreed with him.

“Well,” he sighed. “Matthew is stitched up right now. I’ve listened to the recordings, you got to the right conclusion. Fletcher had confirmed that the hotel information was leaked by the informant from the other side.”

“Recording?” Coach was surprised.

“There was a recorder on the bookshelf. Ray was going to record Matthew’s confession, but we got what we got. It’s not that bad.”

Mickey’s voice sounded too careless for a man who Russians and Chinese were out to get. Who was quite successfully framed and nearly fucked.

“Does it just seem, or you’ve got good news?”

Mickey hesitated, doubting if he could reveal such information on the phone. Coach was ready to be left without an answer – anyway, he’s not Mickey Pearson’s man to share his plans with him. Even for he could tell Ray about them. But Mickey again surprised him:

“Our Russian friend came out of his coma. And had already confirmed that the conflict was settled; so now we don’t need one hundred percent proof. I’ll just give someone to Russians and see them finish him off.”

Something in his voice, metal ring or specific firmness, could tell that Mickey wouldn’t wait for Ray. Now Ray’s wariness was excessive, too passive in the situation that had rapidly changed. It seemed, Mickey had everything ready to deal with all the problems in one blow. Coach didn’t want to be out in his way.

“Right. Is there something you want to tell Ray?”

“Tell him that everything’s under control. He has a day off today. And tomorrow, when he wakes up – he should call me,” he paused again. “Take care of him, all right?”

Coach only scoffed:

“I know.”

And hung up. He obviously liked hanging up on Michael.

Ray woke up when they were almost at his house and said first thing:

“I don’t want to go home.”

Coach humbly shrugged and changed the lane: if he didn’t want then whatever. There are other places.

Probably, Coach’s flat wasn’t the best of them: not cosy, with cheap furniture, too small, and honestly not really settled. If Coach wanted to show Ray the place where he felt comfortable, he would show him around the gym, telling him about each and every certificate which filled the walls, every medal and trophy, every paper on the notice board, poster and inscription. But going to the club now was wrong, and Ray had been there though incidentally. Another significant place was his parent’s house: quite spacious, with stone walls always warm. But it was in Ireland, and other people had been living there for a long time. Everything left from it for Coach were childhood memories and regret.

So he took Ray to his place, and Ray didn’t ask anything and gave no orders. He stopped watching the road, as soon as they missed the turn to his street, leaned back in his seat, closing his eyes blissfully.

They parked near a shabby four storey house, which was seeking major repairments. Ray didn’t even wince looking at this monster – maybe because it wasn’t the first time he saw it. He silently followed Coach, step by step, until they were in the flat.

In the first place Coach took off Ray’s jacket, put it on the hook, because he never had hangers in the hall (anyway it was ruined by blood). Ray didn’t say a word, only took off his fancy dealer boots, not even bending down, stepping on the heels, as mercilessly as Coach usually treated his shoes.

“Bathroom is there. I’ll bring you some clean clothes.”

Ray nodded and disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door tightly behind him. Coach tried to remember if he turned the boiler on in the morning, if there was hot water, but couldn’t.

When he washed his hands in the kitchen, took the clothes, a clean towel and entered the bathroom, it turned out that Ray wasn’t going to take a shower. He was standing at the sink and mechanically soaping up his hands. After forty seconds Coach caught the pattern of actions: take a portion of soap, rub hands five times, thoroughly rub each finger on the right hand, then on the left, soap up wrists, finally put hands under hot water – and repeat. Coach didn’t know which time it already was, but he was sure – it was enough.

“Ray,” he called standing still in the doorway.

Ray sighed but didn’t break the pattern. Coach put a stack of clothes on the washing machine, carefully came up to him from the back – and didn’t feel resistance. Ray pressed up against his chest himself. Coach covered his hands, red from soap and hot water, ending the pattern.

“Last time, and it will be enough,” he said softly, put his chin on Ray’s shoulder.

He took some soap, rubbed it on Ray’s fingers, trying to repeat the steps he had seen. Ray was struggling to keep his hands in mid-air, obediently letting Coach do whatever he did. After all, they washed away the foam, and Coach turned both taps off. Ray let him do that.

“Wanna shower?”

“Later,” Ray refused. He started shivering. “I need to take off the shirt, there’s…”

He broke off, catching air with his mouth from sharp spasm – he wanted to throw up from the thought of blood on the shirt. Coach turned him around, looked into pale face.

“I’ll take it off, put on my t-shirt – have you ever worn t-shirts?”

“In middle school,” Ray said. After Coach’s crazy gaze he chuckled: “I’m joking.”

Coach shook his head, getting to his shirt buttons – Ray didn’t even try to help, avoiding touching the clothes. He was getting out of sleeves like it was a hazmat suit, and not a cotton shirt with brown-red cuffs. The t-shirt looked better – and moreover revealed his beautiful arms.

Coach also took off Ray’s pants, changing them for sweatpants – they were a bit short, but who cared. Coach carefully tied the lace, looking into Ray’s face – he was looking at him as he was some miracle.

“Do you want to say something?”

“Thank you?” Ray said barely audible. “Nobody would ever do more for me.”

“Let’s go,” Coach could only say. He wanted to scream, that it was wrong and unfair.

He was going to take Ray to the room and put him to bed, but Ray wanted tea. So they were in the kitchen now, it was embarrassingly small for the two adult men. But Ray, who was used to spacious rooms and stylish interiors, still didn’t care. He sat down at the table by the window, barely fitting his legs under it, and waited.

Coach changed water in the kettle, pushed the button – a plastic monster started roaring, beginning to heat up. On the shelf he found the biggest cup he had, rinsed it. He opened a fresh pack of earl grey, put a tiny handful into the teapot, cut two red apples – and there the kettle was boiling.

Ray pulled the cup up, embraced its thick ceramic sides with his hands. They were still red. Coach wanted neither eat nor drink, maybe just scream a bit. But Ray wasn’t his subordinate and was too vulnerable now, and so Coach sat with his side to Ray, stretching out his legs aside and started silently waiting.

Ray made the first sip, winced barely visible, but drank more. And then he asked:

“Do you want to talk?”

“And can you?”

Ray chuckled and nodded. He really looked better now, but it still wasn’t worth shouting.

As it wasn’t worth blaming him that he went to Matthew alone, without saying a word to Coach: Ray was in his right. He worked in a way he was used to and reported back only to Mickey – not Coach who had nothing to do with their business. Though maybe later, tomorrow, Coach wouldn’t hold it and would give it hot to him, grumble and maybe (certainly) shout. It was a curious, but not really pleasant riddle on how Ray would take it.

Probably, Ray didn’t want to put him at risk or mix work and relationship. Asking him to elaborate his motives was just arguing in vain: they hardly would escape it in the future. Ray’s work didn’t imply full safety, and urge to protect Coach didn’t imply he would let things slide.

So, Coach asked another thing:

“Pound of flesh… Why did you decide to do it on your own?”

Ray winced, glanced at his hands. Now it was a too sensitive subject and probably Coach shouldn’t have touched it.

“Will you believe if I say I just gone mental, while interrogating Matthew?”

Coach shook his head. Ray blankly smiled.

“I wanted to finish it as soon as possible,” he confessed. “Wanted to cover all of my fuck ups at once, get all affairs in order and go on a vacation… Have you ever been to Maldives? Or we’d better go to the mountains?”

“Fuck ups, Ray?” Coach didn’t let him change the subject. “Were you punishing yourself?”

Ray shrugged neither agreeing nor denying. Coach knew he got the point… and couldn’t do anything about it. It was just Raymond Smith: he was trying to be perfect in everything, especially in his job, and often he did. Though, not this time. Coach could only be by his side, terrified by his own ruthlessness and broken moral compass: Raymond Smith was a cruel man, gangster, killer, but Coach wasn’t touched by it. Probably because they had a lot in common.

“All right, knock it off,” he sighed. “Do you want to hear the news you slept off?”

Sure, Ray couldn’t deny such a generous offer. He asked in return:

“Do you have my phone?”

“I do, and you won’t get it today,” Coach assured him. “Mickey asked to tell you to call him tomorrow. He stopped by Matthew’s and took the recorder and knows everything. Good thing that there shouldn’t be any problems with Russians, Aslan senior woke up and confirmed that they made a deal with Mickey.”

Coach didn’t tell about his suspicion on Mickey’s plans: the last thing he needed was Ray in such a condition calling or worse going to his boss. Anyway, there was no use of him now.

“Tomorrow then,” Ray unexpectedly obeyed. “What’s next in your programme of overprotectiveness: a lullaby before bed?”

Coach got the hint and took Ray to bed.

***

Opening his eyes Coach didn’t understand at once who he was and where he was. It happened when you woke up too quickly from a strange anxious feeling or some nightmare. He was looking at the ceiling, glowing-white in the dark until he understood Ray was doing the same.

Coach looked at the watch – it was only ten in the evening.

“Everything all right?” he asked.

“Woke up and couldn’t fall asleep again,” Ray said, voice husky from sleep. “Not used to falling asleep at daytime. Or it’s from nerves.”

“All together,” Coach stretched out his arm to the bedside lamp, found the button and turned the light on.

He saw dishevelled Ray without glasses, in his home t-shirt, under his blanket, and couldn’t help but smile. Now it didn’t seem as weird. Now he couldn’t sleep at all, - he was going to stay up, until Ray asked to lay by his side.

“How long have you been like that?”

Coach climbed out from under the blanket, pressed his knee to Ray’s hot side. His hand on its own stretched out to fix a strand of white hair that fell on Ray’s forehead.

“Twenty minutes or so,” Ray answered. Let fix his hair but didn’t let take the hand away, held on to Coach’s wrist: “Look, the red string’s about to tear.”

Coach stared at his right hand: red string really got thinner, wore down. He couldn’t remember the last time he changed it – he was too preoccupied.

“True,” he said pointlessly. Ray’s fingers were still holding him, prehensile and hot.

“Will you tell me what’s that for?”

Coach knew that his face changed but he couldn’t help. The subject was painful and personal.It was the right time to speak about it in the dim of a small room, after waking up from a heavy dream. With a man you can open up to.

Today Ray gave Coach an opportunity to witness his vulnerability, and also let him help. And Coach had a rule: sincerity for sincerity. Pain for pain.

And so, he began from afar:

“Protection from evil eye, joint treatment… I think you’ve heard of this – nothing in common with good sense.”

Ray nodded, smiling softly. He fidgeted, got a bit up and leaned into bed’s backrest – now they looked like kids, who gathered in the attic to have a creepy stories evening. Or not in the attic, and not creepy at all – just stories from life. They often were even worse because happened in real life.

“There’s one more meaning, nicer: red string to protect you from your own anger.”

“Pompous,” Ray hummed. “I could use it.”

“It’s also nonsense,” Coach tried to smile but couldn’t. “It’s a memory for me.”

Ray tactfully didn’t ask who it was about, but Coach explained anyway:

“Memory of my daughter. She saw one on her friend in kindergarten,begged her gran for a ball of string, waited till I came back home from work and tied. We had matching ones. And now I renew it myself from time to time.”

Ray’s fingers clutched his wrist tighter, the look in his eyes was complicated: concentrated sorrow. Life taught Coach not to confuse it with pity.

“She had leucosis. The expensive treatment didn’t help, Anny died, and a month later her gran followed. I was a terrible single dad: always working, if not working, then in the ring. I was building my career leaving all on my mother. I didn’t notice anything else around me.”

It was easy to speak. Way easier than he imagined. Ray was listening and tightly holding his hand, not letting him get lost in his memories, go deep into unimportant. For example, Coach didn’t want to speak about his wife – they broke up right after his daughter was born, he didn’t feel any guilt, and this pain had already gone away. Workaholism was still with him.

“But when I lost them, I was broken. Nearly disrupted a special operation, involuntarily was sent on leave and didn’t return to special forces. After half a year I came to my senses, sold the flat and parent’s house to close the credit debt,” he made a sharp inhale, for the first time noticing the lack of air. “And found myself here, because the only thing I had left was the ring. My name’s James, but you already know it.”

A memory of burning paper in the fireplace appeared before his eyes - Ray stirred it up and somehow with coal thongs took out the melted memory stick. Since then and from now on they had never talked about his past, which Fletcher was trying to unmask – Coach really appreciated it.

Ray caressed his wrist with a thumb, and it was more than any words. Except for:

“Can I tie a new one?”

By the look in Ray’s eyes, the way he carefully was looking for doubt in Coach’s face, it all was clear and they both understood - it wasn’t just help. It was a promise.

***

In the gym that was empty after closing, Mel for the first time ever made Benny give up, using the chokehold. Ernie and Primetime were fucking around near the ring, but forgot to turn the camera on, and Jim missed all the interesting things, typing a message to Coach who dropped off the radar.

Aslan senior despite his doctor’s prohibition was talking to his relatives from Russia via video call – finally he could assure them that his son would have a proper funeral in his home country. He couldn’t do more for Aslan, no matter how much he wanted to.

Matthew Berger was staring at the ceiling and smiling, diligently ignoring the pain in his arm. For the first time in a long time he was calm, because Michael promised peace, and this time Matthew believed him. He could stay in Britain, save the established relations – he was just about to leave the country. But now things got better, and everything went as planned. There were just some uncertainties.

Fletcher was celebrating his new-found freedom in his favourite pub: he didn’t doubt that the quickly collected information on Chinese will let Mickey end his war. And it meant they could call it quits. From the other side of the bar a pretty blond boy saluted him with a glass of whiskey, a new screen play was blooming in his head. Life was good.

Mickey Pearson was respectfully shaking the hand of the Chinese mafia boss, feeling on top of the world: the information Fletcher had collected on Dry Eye and Silent Joe convinced him that Mickey was the offended party in this prolonged conflict. And as a gesture of good will they would give him Silent Joe. But truth be told, he didn’t know about it yet.

***

Coach couldn’t tell Ray anything but:

“Five times around the wrist, seven knots.”

And take a ball of string from the bedside table without breaking the touch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that's it. Thank you for reading, leaving kudos and comments. <3  
> Hope you liked it. Got some new works to translate. Stay tuned.


End file.
